Defensive end completes a July Hail Mary

Every player that signs with the Montana Grizzlies football program wants to get on the gridiron sooner rather than later, and Glacier High’s Hank Nuce made sure it was sooner.

In his sophomore campaign last fall the defensive end played all 13 games and registered two sacks.

This summer, though, he really stepped up, giving stem cells to save another.

The process actually began in the spring of 2021, when he signed up for the Be The Match program, which finds donors for patients suffering from blood cancers like leukemia and other life-threatening diseases.

Last fall, Nuce’s phone rang.

“I don’t remember which week it was; it was late in the season,” he said. “They said they were going to set it up in the spring.”

This brought back memories of 2009, when Villanova and the Griz were on a collision course for the FCS title. Villanova receiver Matt Szczur and his teammates signed up for the “Get in the Game and Save a Life” program, and he turned out to be a 1-in-80,000 match with a toddler.

Then-Wildcat coach Andy Talley learned about it while the season was in full swing, which surely made all the red blood cells drain from his face.

“And they asked me, ‘Which game is he going to miss?’” Talley said that December. “I was like, ‘Oh, my God, he’s our best player.’”

Szczur played out the season, including a particularly good title game that Villanova won 23-21 over the Griz. The following May, the two-sport star — Szczur played five seasons in the Major Leagues with the Cubs and Padres — donated bone marrow to a young Ukrainian girl named Anastasia Olkhovsky.

We don’t know Nuce’s odds and we don’t know the recipient, yet, but his story is similar. The expected call in the spring actually came in July.

“It was like two and a half weeks before fall camp, so I was pretty worried it was going to set me back a couple weeks,” he said of his donation date. “It just happened super quick. They said, ‘In like three weeks, we need a donation. Is that OK?’ I was like, 'Yeah.'”

The son of a Kalispell physician was bound for Seattle for a little less-invasive procedure than was in place 14 years ago.

“I had to take these injections that boosted my stem cell count for four days,” he said. “Then they flew me out to Seattle to their donation center. They drew blood out of one arm, spun it around and took the stem cells out and put it back in the other arm.

“I mean, it took about four-and-a-half hours, but it was easy. I just sat there.”

He won’t hear the details of who he helped for a year, but the success rate for such a donation is a major reason these programs exist.

“It is considered a lifesaving thing,” Nuce said. “I don’t even know the patient’s name. But I’ll learn it eventually.”

Nuce couldn’t lift or work out for a couple days after, but felt no major effects and was at full strength at the start of fall camp. Unfortunately he suffered a pectoral injury at camp, and barring a medical miracle — that’s a big ask, he’s already been part of one — the junior-to-be won’t be making a sack for the Griz this fall.

Just don’t tell me he didn’t contribute in 2023, because he did.

Fritz Neighbor can be reached at 758-4463 or fneighbor@dailyinterlake.com.