Love at an early age
I was about 5 when my parents put me in soccer. I remember being in a local YMCA league, the ridiculous reversible jerseys and the whole nine yards.
When I was about 12, I decided it was the sport I wanted to take seriously. I loved how active it was; you're always moving and trying different positions.
Sweat equity When I was a kid, I was not a natural soccer player, but I loved it. I realized if I worked hard, I could be good at it.
I watched players my own age that were natural athletes, and they didn't have to work very hard. I started to really dedicate myself to it and started to pass them up just because of my work ethic.
I absolutely loved that part of it — seeing how much I could improve if I put in the work.
Moving up I played soccer in college for the U of M for four years and went one step past and played some semipro soccer for the Twin Cities Phoenix, which was a feeder team for the Minnesota Thunder.
I dabbled briefly with some professional gigs, but found out I was probably not good enough to make a career out of it. So I got into coaching. A lot of the reason I was a good player was because I was a coach on the field and knew the game.
