In his first public statement since he was wounded by a stray bullet, B.C.'s Nathan Demian delivered a message of encouragement to his teammates at Ohio State University from his hospital bed.

"I really wish I could be with you guys," Demian said.

His voice was hoarse and he had a tube in his nose, but the Langley native was smiling in the video posted to social media.

"I'm so excited to watch you guys just dominate and go out and put in all the work, all the effort, all the grind that we've done this whole entire year to go and show the whole world what Ohio State's all about.," Demian encouraged the Buckeyes, who were about to play in the NCAA semifinals on Friday night, Dec. 13.

"This is why you come to Ohio State, this is why you play sports, because you want to play in those games where everybody watches and that matters," Demian said.

"We've earned that right. We've been number one this whole year because of all the hard work we've put in, all the belief we've put in with each other, from the work we put in England before the summer, to preseason, to every single practice and game, working for one another."

A report in the Columbus-Dispatch newspaper said Nathan and his brother Joel, who plays for Indiana, were making a late night pizza run Sunday morning, Dec. 8, after a big Ohio State win when two cars passing by started shooting at each other.

Nathan was wounded in the abdomen, and rushed to Ohio State University's Wexner Medical Center.

A university statement said the "off-campus shooting" occurred following the Ohio State men's soccer match with Wake Forest, which Ohio State won 3-0 to advance to the NCAA tournament semifinals. 

"[Demian]  was an innocent bystander, is not a suspect in any way, and was not involved in any altercation," the statement said.

In an Oct. 24, 2019 Langley Advance Times article about Demian playing for Canada at the FIFA U-17 World Cup in Brazil, the up-and-coming centre back said he'd been playing since he was 10 years old.

He described playing for Canada as 鈥渁 huge honour.鈥�

鈥淲hen I was 12 years old old, I wrote a letter to my future self for an English project, and one of the things I wanted to achieve by the time I graduated high school was to represent Canada at the U-17 World Cup,鈥� he recalled.

After his mother, a Canadian-Egyptian met and married his father in Egypt, they moved to Canada and Langley, where they raised seven children.

Demian said growing up in Langley 鈥渞eally shaped me and all of my brothers and sisters into the people we are today.鈥�

He played with Surrey United SC in the EA SPORTS BC Soccer Premier League before joining Whitecaps FC Residency in 2015.

An Ohio State  team profile noted Demian played club soccer for the Vancouver Whitecaps as a defender from 2015-21, was a member of Team Canada in 2017 (U15) and 2019 (U17).

He was a captain for the U15 team and assistant captain for the U19 squad for Team Canada.
In the Ohio State profile, Demian said he hoped to play professional soccer at the highest level someday and then pursue a career in medicine.

Despite Demian's  message of encouragement, number-one-ranked Ohio State fell to No. 13-seeded Marshall 1-0 Friday night.