Surprise! Mats Zuccarello gives a kid street hockey lesson in Norway
Rangers forward stops by to talk with 12-year-old in Oslo who was practicing in his driveway
NHL.com @NHLdotcom
Who better to give a little advice on how to play like Mats Zuccarello than Mats Zuccarello?
Edvin Velle, a 12-year-old resident of Olso, Norway, was imitating his idol outside his house on Friday, when suddenly the New York Rangers forward appeared.
Velle was practicing his shot in his driveway when Zuccarello saw him and stopped by to talk hockey.
"Often when I train, I think of NHL players, and suddenly there was one there," Edvin told the Oslo-based newspaper Aftenposten. "Zuccarello is my biggest role model, so it was incredibly cool to meet him."
Velle, an avid youth hockey player, was obviously surprised to see the pro in front of his house.
"It's so nice... to take time for something like that," Linn Stalsberg, Velle's mother, told Aftenposten.
Velle snapped a selfie with Zuccarello, and Stalsberg captured a photo of her son getting a lesson with the Rangers leading scorer and Norwegian hockey icon and posted it to Instagram.
"When you stand outside your yard and practice shooting for yourself, and maybe daydreaming about hockey and heroes, and suddenly Mats Zuccarello is right next to you," his mother's caption said.
Zuccarello, who is in his native Norway during the Rangers offseason, has played the most games (383) of the eight Norwegian-born players to play in the NHL, and he and Andreas Martinsen of the Colorado Avalanche are the only two active players from Norway in the NHL.