At just 14 years old, Teddy Blueger knew if he wanted to achieve his dream of playing in the National Hockey League, he would have to leave his native Latvia to develop somewhere else.

So he and his parents, Valentin and Jana, began looking for options. They scheduled a couple of tryouts in Moscow, as Latvia rests along the eastern border of Russia and Teddy's hometown of Riga is just an hour-and-a-half flight from the capital.

They also began searching across the Atlantic, as Valentin's sister Marina moved to Brooklyn's Brighton Beach neighborhood - which consists of tight-knit Russian and Eastern European communities - back in the 1990s. She had told them of some boarding prep schools in the eastern U.S., so the Blueger family set up a couple of visits overseas and booked their flights to America.

A couple of weeks before they were set to leave, Teddy was eating lunch at home with Janna after school while taking in a rerun of a game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Minnesota Wild.

"They were watching TV and somebody said on the TV that Sidney Crosby went to Shattuck-St. Mary's in Minnesota," Valentin said. "They said, 'Let's look at that.' And that's how he ended up there."

Teddy immediately went online, did some research and decided to add a visit to Shattuck-St. Mary's onto the itinerary that they had already put together - eventually choosing to attend the storied prep school that has groomed numerous hockey stars, most notably Crosby.

And now, over a decade later, Blueger has not only accomplished that dream of playing in the National Hockey League - his locker stall is next to Crosby's as his teammate on the Pittsburgh Penguins.

"It's pretty cool," Blueger said. "Especially early on, to be around him up close - I think the coolest part was how easy-going and down to earth he is. He talks to you as if he's just one of the guys."

***

Blueger was born in Riga, the capital city of Latvia, a country in the Baltic region of northern Europe. It is bordered by Estonia to the north, Lithuania to the south, Russia to the east, Belarus to the southeast and shares a maritime border with Sweden to the west.

While Blueger's family moved to a suburb of Riga called Jurmala when he was 5 years old, he still identifies with the capital as his hometown since that's where he spends most of his time whenever he is there. "That's where you go to do everything, pretty much," Blueger said.

Riga is home to over 630,000 citizens, a third of Latvia's total population. Blueger loves the history that the capital provides.

"It's like 800-something years old, so it's got cobblestone streets and old buildings and a pedestrian area that's cool which is filled with bars and restaurants and museums and art galleries," Blueger said. "There's a lot of history, a lot of cool stuff. It's been around for so long, it was kind of like an old trading port in between Europe, like going up to Scandinavia and then back down."

Growing up, Blueger went to the International School of Latvia alongside the children of embassy employees and foreign businesspeople, which is why he speaks perfect, virtually unaccented English. He also speaks Russian, which is his parents' native language as Latvia was part of the Soviet Union until its collapse in 1991, some French and of course, Latvian.

Teddy got started playing hockey at the age of 3 because Valentin also played when he was younger. His mother would take him and his younger brother Robert to his father's men's league games, and Teddy remembers always being excited to go.

"Hockey is probably one of the most popular sports, if not the most popular sport in Latvia," Teddy said. "It's been awesome because everyone follows hockey really close, and the national team is a huge deal. So for the World Championship and tournaments like that, the fans travel really, really well and support us really well. So that's a really cool part of it."

That being said, with Latvia being such a tiny country, the level of competition wasn't where it needed to be for Blueger to truly develop. He estimates that there were about 12-14 youth hockey teams, and while his team - the Balderis Hockey School - played against a team that featured fellow future NHLers Zemgus Girgensons and Elvis Merzlikins, it still wasn't enough.

That's when the Bluegers decided, as a family, that Teddy would have to leave home to further his career.

"We understood for his progress, for his sake, he had to go develop somewhere where there is high-level hockey," Valentin said. "He was all about hockey. He said he wanted to go here to continue his progress. He said whatever it takes, he'll go to the States just to pursue his career. He was very, very devoted and dedicated to hockey."

***

After their visits out East, the Blueger family spent two days in Minnesota so that Teddy could spend time at Shattuck-St. Mary's. While there, Teddy got a tour of the campus, did a number of interviews, filled out some paperwork and skated a couple of times.

After that, he and his parents returned to Latvia. And while it took a while for Teddy to hear back, when he did, it was good news.

"I got in," Teddy said. "And that's where I decided to go."

Credit: Paul Swenson Photography

Part of the reason he took to Shattuck-St. Mary's right away was the same reason he loves his hometown of Riga - because of the history. The school, located in Faribault - about an hour south of the Twin Cities - was built in 1858.

"The whole school has got a really old feel to it," Blueger said. "It's over 150 years old, so even though it's changing - they're modernizing now - I thought at the time that was a cool part of it, that the buildings were really old and there's a lot of history. Not just on the hockey side of it, but on the school side of it too. It was just kind of a cool environment."

Despite moving all the way across the Atlantic to another continent at such a relatively young age, Blueger remembers the experience as being an exciting one.

"The cool part of it was that I wasn't the only one who was there, everyone was doing it," he said. "Some people were moving a couple of hours from home. Other people were moving from different continents and stuff. But we were all kind of in the same position, all over there to play hockey. The other cool part of it is that you're always with your friends in the dorms and in class and on the ice, obviously."

Upon arriving, Blueger quickly realized that he had a lot of catching up to do when it came to his development on the ice.

"I think when I first came over here to Shattuck, that's when I really realized that I'm not really that good after all," Blueger said with a laugh. "Kind of thought I was better than I was because I hadn't really seen much of the competition in the outside world. That was a bit of a wakeup call."

While his coach, Tom Ward, remembers that Blueger's skating needed work, his first impression was that the teenager was a skillful kid with smarts and hockey acumen.

"He just needed time," Ward said. "He was just a little kid when he first came over. There was definitely something there. He had whatever 'it' is."

Credit: Shattuck-St. Mary's School

In order to reach his potential, Blueger had to put the work in - and he couldn't have asked for a better role model in that regard than Crosby.

Ward first met Crosby when he coached him in an All-Star game as part of the Mac's Midget tournament in Calgary. They became familiar with each other through that, and like Blueger, Crosby eventually decided to come down to Shattuck-St. Mary's for a visit.

"The rest was history," Ward said.

Crosby played at the school during the 2002-03 season, racking up 72 goals and 162 points in just 57 games played as he led the team to a USA Hockey Under-17 national championship.

And while Ward said that Crosby enjoyed the anonymity of it, the chance to 'just come here and disappear and be a normal high school kid and have fun and still play hockey,' his impact and legacy was lasting - to the point where a teenager from Latvia decided to move across the Atlantic Ocean because of him.

"It's cool," Crosby said. "Obviously I have a lot of pride and some great memories going to Shattuck. If that influenced somebody else and helped them, I feel like I had a great experience. I think that if he's able to benefit and learn from that and trust and have confidence in that step, then that's great. I feel good about that, for sure."

Ward used Crosby as an example to his players a lot with his work ethic and unselfish nature.

"Sidney would be a good leader if he was just an average player, but he happens to be super-gifted," Ward said. "Just the way he goes about his business is the right way to go about your business. That's a good example for whether you're going to be the next coming of something or you're going to be a fourth-liner."

Crosby was always the first one on the ice and the last one off, which is something Blueger does every single day he takes the ice in Pittsburgh. Today, for example, Blueger stayed on the ice for 45 minutes after practice ended - including about 15-20 minutes by himself.

"That's one of our mottos here at our school, is always be the first one on and always be the last one off," Ward said. "That's a motto that we've had here forever. Teddy definitely takes to that. He's a worker. He wants to improve his game. He understands that it's not just going to happen. He's got to go make it happen."

Like Crosby, Blueger went on to help Shattuck-St. Mary's succeed at the highest level. The team won back-to-back national championships in 2011 and '12, with Blueger leading the team in scoring that second year with 88 points (24G-64A) in 51 games while also partaking in the 2012 World Junior Championship with Latvia.

"He was a top-six forward on both of those teams and he was out there in everything, killing penalties, on the power play, 5-on-5, 6-on-5," Ward said. "He's a real reliable player. Teddy is always a responsible guy and you could always trust him to make good plays and smart plays and do what was best for the team. He played a huge role in those championships."

***

The Penguins drafted Blueger right out of Shattuck-St. Mary's, in the second round (54th overall) in 2012. While Blueger had some conversations and meetings with Penguins staff during the year, he had no idea they were going to take him that high.

"It was kind of a weird feeling, I think I was a little bit shocked," Blueger said. "Once they started announcing and said 'Shattuck,' I think there was only four or five of us that were on the radar so it happened so quick that I just got up. My dad was there with me, I hugged him then did all the pictures and stuff. It all happened super fast; it was all kind of hard to process. But it was definitely really, really surprising and exciting."

One aspect of being drafted by the Penguins that did register with Blueger was that he now had a real chance to potentially play alongside somebody he looked up to so much in Crosby.

"I kind of dreamed of making it and to actually play with him on the same team and be a part of the team," Blueger said. "Getting drafted was a step in the right direction. But there's plenty of guys that get drafted and don't end up playing, so I think there's no guarantee or anything like that. I think I realized that, too."

After finishing high school at Shattuck-St. Mary's, Blueger didn't go far for college. He chose to play at Minnesota State University-Mankato, just about an hour-long drive west on MN-60. After four years there, he spent two-and-a-half seasons in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton working on his game.

At times, it felt like it might never end up happening - but Blueger finally earned his first call-up and made his NHL debut on Jan. 30, 2019 versus Tampa Bay at the age of 24 - ten years after that fateful trip to Shattuck-St. Mary's.

"I think there's been times where you kind of struggle and maybe there's been times where it seems like it's so far away that you'll never get there," Blueger said. "Because obviously it took me a while to get here. When I dreamed of being here, I kind of dreamed of it being earlier than until I was 24. I don't know if expecting is the right word, but I wasn't hoping to have to wait that long. But that's the way it played out."

While Blueger may have gotten discouraged at different times over that 10-year period, he never stopped working.

"It's such a tough competition, it's such a high-end league," Valentin said. "So many skilled players. A lot of things have to come together, including some luck and everything. But the basis for all of this is hard work. Whatever talent you have, without hard work you can't do anything. It's incredible.

And now because of it, Blueger has earned a spot alongside his hockey hero.

"He's been thrown in a lot of challenging situations and great opportunities as well," Crosby said. "I think he's made the most of them. He's continued to get better. He's got a great work ethic. He takes it really serious. He wants to be the best he possibly can. You can see that he's getting better because of that and gaining confidence. He's a really, really solid two-way forward."

"We are extremely proud," Valentin said. "He deserves it. He worked very hard to do it, to accomplish it. He saw it at the very beginning. Everybody's proud. We have all of Latvia watching Pittsburgh games now. Pittsburgh gear is on sale everywhere. Everybody is proud."

*Photos courtesy of Paul Swenson Photography/Shattuck-St. Mary's School