Part III: On his own, on the ice and off

The phone rang just before 5 a.m. in the Mattson house in Chanhassen, long before anyone was awake. Mom, came Nick Mattson's weak voice. I'm throwing up. What do I do?

His mother, Julie, wiped the sleep from her eyes. She reminded Nick of the rules of his USA Hockey program. If a player gets sick and has to miss school, it's his responsibility to call the coach himself and tell him.

Nick knew that. But living far from home, being sick and being under all kinds of new pressures, he reverted to instinct: He called his mom.

During his first month in Ann Arbor, Mich., where he had moved to join the under-17 team of USA Hockey's National Team Development Program, Nick had adjusted well to the lively household of his host family. One day, when he was chatting on the phone with his mom, she heard the Schmunk family's three young sons banging on Nick's bedroom door.

Hey, he shouted. I'm talking to my parents. Stop it, or I'll give you a wedgie!

The next thing Julie heard was the little boys squealing and laughing as they ran up the stairs.

But now, a month into the program, the intense routine and long absence from home and family were starting to overwhelm Nick.

He crawled out of bed every day at 6 a.m. and rode to school with teammate Drew Shore. Classes started at 7:10, and at 1:35 p.m. he headed to the rink.

There was no time to make friends, no time to hang out or attend football games. After class, his life became hockey, hockey, hockey.

His grueling daily routine at the Ann Arbor Ice Cube included aerobic workouts on a slide board, a couple of hours of intense practice and a weightlifting session. Nick especially dreaded the days the boxing coach -- "a real boot-camp guy," he said -- led them through rigorous cross-training. When all that was done, Nick usually stayed late to shoot pucks. He rarely got home before 7:15 p.m.

The days left Nick so exhausted he usually slept through most of Sunday, his only day off.

He had other things weighing on his mind, too. He had been offered full scholarships to universities in North Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin, and he felt pressured to make a decision; coaches of the top teams expected elite players to commit early.

He missed his friends back in Minnesota, who were about to begin their high school hockey seasons.

And he was homesick.

Nick's parents traveled to Marquette, Mich., to see him play in late September. They could tell he was struggling. "If we can just get him through October, that would be good," Julie said.

But a week later, Nick was back in Chanhassen, sleeping in his own bed.

Homesick and uncertainty

He wasn't supposed to come home until Dec. 7. But the first weekend of October the team had a Saturday off, and Nick called his parents. I've got to get home. Everybody else on the team is going home. He missed his old school. He missed the guys who'd been his friends for most of his life, so much so that he fired off 4,500 text messages to them in just one month.

He listened wistfully as they talked about homecoming weekend and getting their driver's licenses, teen rites he had either given up or delayed for sport's sake. And as life and hockey grew tougher to navigate, he missed the comfort and security of simply being home.

Kevin and Julie got him a plane ticket and hoped that a quick visit would ease his unhappiness. It did, for the 32 hours he was home.

Mentally and physically drained, Nick spent much of Saturday sleeping, then met up with his old hockey buddies to attend an Upper Midwest Elite League game in New Hope.

But the weekend went by too fast. Sunday, after lunch with his parents and grandparents, he tucked a painting from little sister Ellie into his bag and went right back to the homesickness and the workload and the uncertainty in Michigan.

At Chaska High, Nick's ability to control the puck and create offense had made him a star. In Ann Arbor -- where opponents were bigger, stronger, faster and as much as five years older -- he was starting to realize that what had worked in high school was not enough.

Nick was one of the youngest, slightest players on the team: barely 16 years old, barely 158 pounds. His coaches stressed he had to add muscle and strength, play much tighter defense and expand his repertoire of skills if he was to compete on an elite level.

Nick had understood that going in. He had done enough research to know that the program was going to test his limits. And though he was a confident player, he was also humble enough to know he had a lot to learn. That was why he had come.

But when he lay on his bed, so bone-tired from 12 hours of school and practice that he could barely move, he found himself wrestling to stay positive. "When I had a bad day at the rink last year, I'd whine to my parents," he said.

He wasn't about to do that to his host family. So Nick tried his best to be upbeat at the Schmunks' dinner table. When his body ached, when he made a mistake on the ice, when he wished he could just get on a plane and go home, he reminded himself: You're here for a reason. This isn't supposed to be easy. You have to toughen up, be independent and find a way to get through it.

But as the autumn wore on, it grew harder.

His parents weren't surprised. They acknowledged that Nick had led a charmed and rather sheltered life, and they believed he would benefit from the challenges of living on his own in a hockey program that forced him to get better every day.

Life wouldn't always roll out a red carpet for him. He needed to learn to be self-sufficient, to solve his own problems, to move toward adulthood.

Nick rarely called home. When his mom called him, he told her that the coaches had given up on him. They think I'm a bad player, he said. And I don't know how to ask for help.

She explained what he already knew: that this was all part of growing up, that what felt so painful now would eventually reveal itself as a watershed moment in the future.

"Character building sucks, doesn't it?" Julie asked her son.

Yes, he said, it definitely did.

And it was about to hurt even worse.

Missing a game

Nick had played in all 12 games, but he had struggled; his ice time had been spotty, and his only points had come on two assists. He had not scored any goals.

On Oct. 30, the team lost 10-2 to rival Mahoning Valley. The next day, the players went to the rink for practice, only to find that their angry coaches had canceled it. Instead, they would study videos of their loss. Afterward, head coach Ron Rolston announced that only some of the players would travel to Alpena, Mich., for the next game.

He had written their names on a whiteboard, he said. The eight whose names appeared in a separate column would stay behind.

As the projection screen rose to reveal the roster, Nick looked for his name with a feeling of great foreboding. He was not surprised when he saw it -- on the wrong side. Oh, great, he thought.

Benched, for the first time in his life.

When Shore drove him home, Nick complained bitterly. He felt sheepish about telling his host parents that he would be home for dinner on Thursday, rather than on the road with his team. In less than a week, the team was heading to Russia for its first international game. Would he still be on the bench then?

The day of the Alpena game, the benched players were told to lift weights by themselves after practice. Then they were to go to their locker room and watch the game in silence. No laughing, no chatting, no fun. They were to watch quietly and reflect on why they weren't in Alpena with their team.

Nick remembered how he had felt when Chaska lost in the Section 6AA semifinals in 2007. That was the biggest hole that hockey had ever torn in his heart, but he suffered with his team.

This was worse. And he had to face it alone.

Rachel Blount • 612-673-4389

Coming Wednesday: Nick hits the ice in Russia with new resolve.