Las Vegan, BYU soccer player conquers drug addiction, to play for Team USA

PROVO, Utah — Matthew Kurtz will walk onto a pitch this week in Taipei, Taiwan, with USA on his chest. He’s part of the Brigham Young men’s soccer team chosen to represent the country at the World University Games.

But his path to get there was anything but easy. He was cut after his freshman year and didn’t become a starter until this season. He endured being a practice squad player and tore his ACL two years ago.

And from the time he was 16, he was a drug addict.

‘Trying to be different’

Kurtz, now 25, was a high school soccer star growing up in Las Vegas. His Centennial team seldom lost in the four years he played varsity until he graduated in 2010.

The day after his high school graduation, he moved to Provo and started practicing with BYU. He was tall, handsome, athletic, a good student — the picturesque model of what a young Mormon man should be. On the surface, life could not be going much better.

But below the surface was the beginning of an addiction. First, it was nothing atypical of a high school kid — the occasional drink here, the occasional puff of weed there. Then it turned to opioids: A friend’s Lortab and OxyContin and Vicodin. Soon he couldn’t stop.

“It wasn’t an injury,” Kurtz said. “I almost wish I could say it was, but it was just curiosity. Trying to be different. Wanting to be different.”

It didn’t help him that he was not having the best success on the soccer pitch. He was cut after his freshman season and played his sophomore year on the practice squad.

He hadn’t stopped taking pills.

“It was pain relief from life but not any physical pain,” he said.

He had a brief cleanse during his Mormon mission in Orlando, Florida, in 2012. He spent two years away from Provo — and away from drugs — but when he returned in late 2014, his opioid use had expanded to include heroin.

Kenedee Grieve, his girlfriend at the time, recalled Kurtz telling her early in their relationship, “Kenedee, I have a heroin addiction. Are you in or out?”

“I just remember feeling so scared,” Grieve said. “I said I’m in, because I just really felt that this person was somebody I wanted to get to know better and I saw all the good qualities of him, and that’s what kept me.

“We started dating, and it got really hard really fast.”

Grieve said she was essentially dating two people. When he was high, he was happy. When he came down, fits of depression and anxiety set in.

“I stayed because I knew he didn’t love himself, and I decided to love him for him,” Grieve said.

It was hard for Grieve, but it was manageable. Then in January 2015, the spiral for Kurtz truly began. On the final day of soccer tryouts, he was playing defense and planted his right leg to try to pivot. He turned, but his knee did not.

His ACL was torn, and he thought his soccer career was over.

And for someone with a history of misusing pain pills, what happened next was chillingly predictable.

“This is right when pretty much everything picked up,” Kurtz said. “All the drug use, everything. Just my depression, all the hate I could imagine. I didn’t communicate with anybody, and it’s just a really dark time. It’s hard for me to even think about.”

Grieve went on her mission, they fell out of touch and broke up. He withdrew from classes and began stealing from his parents to finance his fix. For years, whenever he bought drugs, he got enough to satisfy his immediate need. He never stocked up because he was always convinced that each time would be the last time.

Then one day he bought enough for the next day. And it hit him.

“I was like, man, I’m a drug addict,” Kurtz said. “Even though I had been a drug addict for that long period of time, it took me buying extra drugs for the next day to realize, man, I have a real problem.”

Family bond

Not everyone makes it back from this point. But Kurtz had his family.

Kurtz maintained a steady composure when talking about everything he went through and what it did to himself. But he got emotional when he thought about his parents.

They are a tight unit. Kurtz is the youngest of five children. His mother, Sheri, was a stay-at-home mom, and his dad, Ted, is a lawyer in Las Vegas who retires next week.

Kurtz said the worst part of his addiction was what it did to his parents.

“It kills me inside, especially thinking of my parents and all the wrong I’ve done to them. It kills me,” he said while choking back tears. “There’s no way I could have been where I am without them. I wish I could go back and be a better person for them.”

Sheri for a long time struggled to verbalize her emotions. She paused when asked if she was ever angry or embarrassed because of her youngest son.

“Initially, you’re angry,” she said. “In our initial stages, we probably shamed him and didn’t know that’s what we were doing.”

Kurtz was eventually able to turn to his parents, who helped him find the support he needed in the form of a treatment facility. He tried outpatient programs, but after little success, he relented and in October 2015 allowed himself to be admitted to Renaissance Ranch in Bluffdale, Utah, an LDS inpatient facility.

He fell off the wagon a few times after that but said he is clean now, and has been for some time.

“I am far more proud of the road he’s traveled and where he’s at than I am worried about looking back and thinking about the things he did,” Sheri said.

A clean future

Once Kurtz returned from Renaissance Ranch, he devoted himself to why he came to BYU in the first place: playing soccer. He joined the team for a third separate time in the fall of 2016 and was again resigned to being a practice player.

Then in the 2017 season, seven years after he dominated at Centennial, he became a starter for the first time. And Friday, he will represent Team USA against Italy. Pool play includes games Monday against Brazil and Wednesday against Russia.

It’s been a long journey. But after being dismissed from the team, recovering from a knee injury and overcoming an addiction, it makes the destination that much sweeter.

“I’ve made a lot of different mistakes, but I’m thankful, grateful for the opportunities, the time I’ve put forth, and it’s crazy that I finally made a difference and I’m able to be here,” Kurtz said. “I’m not this perfect kid all of the sudden, but I’m trying. I keep working, I keep going, and I’ve had a lot of success and I’m starting to turn that into more success.”

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Contact Justin Emerson at jemerson@reviewjournal.com or (702) 387-2944. Follow @J15Emerson on Twitter.