In the Spotlight

St. Cloud State's Scott Meyer.

Feb. 22, 2001

By P.J. Slinger

Apparently some destinies are created at an early age. Take St. Cloud State goaltender Scott Meyer, for instance.

He knew he wanted to be a goalie from the first time he ever heard about hockey growing up in Grand Forks.

"The first game I ever went to was UND against Wisconsin or Duluth and I was 5 years old," Meyer said. "I was sitting up in the stands and James Patrick took a slapshot. It deflected off the goaltender and hit me right in the chest and knocked me unconscious. That was my baptism to hockey.

"Ever since then, for some reason I wanted to play goalie. Maybe because that was my first save. It was my parents' first trip to a hockey game too, so it was quite an experience for all of us. Maybe all the attention I got fueled the fire even more, I don't know."

Meyer's mom, Cheryl, said from that point on Scott was determined to play hockey.

"We didn't know hockey when we grew up, but Scott said he wanted to play, and we said he could, but he couldn't play goalie."

Or so they thought. Apparently Scott had different ideas.

"Here's this little 7-year-old kid who just wanted to play goalie," Cheryl Meyer said. "When you're that age you don't pick what position you want to play, so when he wasn't goalie he would just stand back near the goal. We asked him why he didn't skate up and he said he had to stay back and help the goalie. And on picture day, it wasn't his turn to be goalie, so he's got this crabby face in the picture because he couldn't wear the equipment."

"I always wanted to play goalie from the beginning," Scott Meyer said. "When you're a kid, you don't know why, it's just certain things you like. I enjoyed skating out, but it wasn't where my heart was."

It was goaltending, and Meyer made every effort to find a place where he could pursue his dream, or perhaps destiny.

"Scott even told us where we'd be living," Cheryl Meyer said. "We moved to Bloomington (Minn.) first, and then he would figure out who needed goalies and that's how he ended up at Holy Angels (private high school), even though we really couldn't afford it. Then he wanted to go to White Bear Lake (Minn.). But he was such a good kid, we couldn't say 'no' to him."

The year they moved to Bloomington, it was too late for Scott to join the traveling team, so he had to play on the in-house league team.

"That was a tough year, but the following year I played for Jefferson and stayed there for some time and played Bantam A's and decided to make the trip to Holy Angels. It was an opportunity to play as a starter as a sophomore. That's what appealed to me the most. I was there for sophomore and junior year, but because of the costs I had to make some decisions."

Cheryl Meyer got a job in White Bear Lake, and as it turns out, Meyer became the goalie for the team that upset Hill-Murray and advanced to the state tournament his senior year.

From there, Meyer hoped to play for the St. Paul Vulcans of the United States Hockey League, but it never happened.

"I had to play in the North American League, which at the time was another whole world," Meyer said. "I played for Danville, and we were horrible. We were awful."

After that season, a USHL team was being formed in Fargo-Moorhead, and Meyer got an opportunity to play.

"Because it was an expansion team, it could have been a situation like I had just come from, but it turned out to be that our team had the likes of (Minnesota State-Mankato's) Jesse Rooney, (UND's) Jeff Panzer, (Colorado College's) Ian Petersen, (UND's) Tim O'Connell. We were young but we had a lot of guys who moved on to college."

While that seemed to be working out, the Fargo-Moorhead Bears, as they were known then, folded the day the playoffs were to begin.

"Unbeknownst to us, our ownership was bogus," Meyer said. "We even had a game-day skate-around before we found out. That left a lot of guys with their hands tied and their options up in the air, including myself. At the time I was wondering what I was going to do."

Meyer ended up going on a visit to MSU-Mankato, but never got an offer. "And at that time Mankato wasn't even full-fledged Division I, so it was kind of like, this can't be a good omen," Meyer said.

But shortly thereafter, he got a call from St. Cloud State.

"I'm definitely happy with the way things turned out," he said. "It took quite a while to get to this level in my career where I'm seen as somebody who contributes every night and has a say in the games. That's what I've always wanted."

Cheryl Meyer said making the Huskies is a testament to her son's dedication.

"I learned from Scott never to give up," she said. "He's more grown up than I am. They say the parents make the kid, but in this case the kid made the parents. He just had the heart, and has such drive. He had to make his own opportunities, and he did. He always finds a way to make things work."

Meyer played in only 11 games through his first two seasons with St. Cloud State.

"I was frustrated and that made me work twice as hard in the summer," he said. "I lifted a lot, ran a ton. I wanted to show that I was a leader. I helped push people. I was in best shape of my life."

And because of it, so was St. Cloud State hockey. Last year Meyer was outstanding, finishing with a WCHA-best .930 save percentage and was named to the all-WCHA Second Team. He broke Huskies records for shutouts in a season and a career with seven.

Why the incredible success?

"I found out I was going to be a father the fall of my junior year, so that put everything in perspective," he said. "Hockey's important, but there's other things in life that are more important that would take precedence that no matter what happens on the ice. My girlfriend was definitely a calming experience knowing she would always be there after I got back from practice. The whole situation was working itself out and it was enjoyable time because of the anticipation of something else. It was almost an inner peace you find with yourself. It sounds corny, but things were just going so well."

Shortly after his junior season ended, his girlfriend Marissa gave birth to their son, Caydon.

"I wouldn't trade it for the world," he said. "That might be hard for some college kids to understand, but I'm older and after this season I'll be moving on with my life, and I already have a great piece of the puzzle."

Then last summer Meyer was selected to be one of three goalies to travel on the all-WCHA team to Norway.

"I got to go on that all-star trip with (UND's) Karl Goehring and (Wisconsin's) Graham Melanson and we got to pick each other's brain and found out that we're not all that different," Meyer said. "We definitely have different preparation styles, but when it comes down to it, our views are pretty similar. It's nice to know they're feeling the same things."

So with the extra experience the Norway trip afforded him, Meyer was ready to go. And he has been just as good, if not better, this season. He has a league-leading .924 save percentage, which is fifth-best in the nation He also has a 2.25 goals-against average, which is third in the WCHA and 11th in the nation.

"People have doubted me my entire life," Meyer said. "People in St. Cloud doubted I could repeat last year, at least numbers-wise. So I worked even harder and even surprised myself."