“I remember my dad was always at every game, coaching me and my brothers,” said Mateo.  

“Growing up, he had a photo with the ball in his hands and it’s funny because ended up being a goalkeeper,” said his dad, Jason.

One day when Mateo wasn't feeling well at practice, his family decided to take him to see the doctor.  

“They said we were going to see an oncologist and we had no reason to know what that was, but we looked it up and then we understood,” Jason said. “As a parent, you don’t really prepare for those types of conversations.”  

Mateo, who was halfway through his sophomore year and had just received his driver's license, was home bound for that first year of treatment.

“Your life as a teenager is dramatically put on hold, just to know how active he was and how it all just stopped was so difficult,” shared his parents.  

The most devastating news for Mateo was that he couldn’t play soccer anymore.  

“That one hurt the most, looking forward to practice and games,” Mateo said. “Thinking I was going to get back to playing one day is what kept me going.” 

“We got to the airport and I could not hold in my excitement chanting all the songs they sing in the stadium, we were dancing, jumping around and screaming,” Mateo recalls. “The moment I walked up the stairs in the stadium and saw the whole field, I got emotional.” 

“You see it on tv so many times and wonder what it’s like, then being part of the crowd and thinking I’m really here was just surreal beyond my wildest imagination.”  

Since returning home, Mateo aspires to have a career involving soccer and to become a coach. 

“I know the impact a good coach can have on a player, so if I can make one kid that happy then I know I’ve done my job,” Mateo said.  

“The last team he was on, Mateo was the captain, and that just says a lot about him and his desire to do something. Whatever he chooses to do next, he’ll probably do the same,” said Jason.