Golden Glover Winning Fight for Life
By Mitch Abramson
DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER

Wednesday, March 18th 2009, 4:00 AM

One second, Angelo Piccirillo, a Daily News Golden Gloves boxer, told the ringside doctor that he was fine following his match.

In the next instant, he collapsed into the arms of his trainer, pawing with his left hand in the air as if he was looking for an imaginary wall to lean against. He had suffered a traumatic head injury.

A former gang member who did time for assault in 2002, Piccirillo had turned a corner in his once-chaotic life. The Astoria product was now a mechanic at a Toyota dealership and had given up drinking and smoking in pursuit of a Golden Gloves title.

But on Saturday, following a 165-pound novice quarterfinal at the Suffolk PAL, Piccirillo, suddenly found himself fighting for his life.

Piccirillo, 24, sustained a subdural hematoma in a loss to Marc Cheatham. Piccirillo took two standing-eight counts in a 5-0 decision.

Cheatham said that Piccirillo never stopped coming forward and forced him to abandon his finesse approach in favor of slugging.

But Piccirillo, aside from blood on his face, appeared fine, and he left the ring steps on sturdy legs.

It wasn't until he went to a corner of the gym to speak with family and friends moments later that he began to hunch over and collapsed into the arms of trainer Frank Burchette.

After a frenetic couple of minutes, Piccirillo was whisked away by a pair of EMTs into a waiting ambulance outside the venue, and was taken to nearby Southside hospital in Bay Shore, where his vital signs began to further deteriorate.

"I felt he may die," said Salvatore Palumbo, a neurosurgeon at Southside. "Or if he did survive I thought he might have big neurological problems."

Gloves ringside physician Robert Polofsky described the night's movements as a "perfect game." He credited the EMTs, the emergency-room doctor, the nurses and Palumbo, whom Polofsky said had "great hands."

An hour after Piccirillo left the ring, he was being operated on by Palumbo, who removed a blood clot on his brain.

Palumbo now feels that Piccirillo, because of his youth and how quickly he reached the hospital, has a "70%-80% chance" for a full recovery.

"If he had been delayed 20-30 minutes more," Palumbo said, "he would not have survived."

Burchette said that Piccirillo, who had never fought before these Gloves, is conscious and able to speak haltingly and eat, although the left side of his body remains weak. He also has no memory of the fight or why he's in the hospital.

"The doctors don't want him to know that he can't fight anymore," said Burchette, who trained Piccirillo at Sunnyside's Pulse/Heartbeat Boxing. "I'm just so happy that he's still with us. It truly is a miracle."

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/more_sports/2009/03/17/2009-03-17_golden_glover_winning_fight_for_life.html