One of the rarest sights in the sports world is an athlete who unintentionally stumbles upon the potential for a professional career. Instead, most players are usually bred for the big-time spotlight since their youth, and know little outside of a life revolving around their sport.
Chris Tweed-Kent, a senior midfielder with high hopes of hearing his name announced during the 2012 MLS SuperDraft next January, breaks away from this stereotype. His story is very different than those of the names that surround his on the mock drafts.
Even though he always “dreamed of it as a little kid,” soccer was never part of his realistic 10-year plan. He was not heavily recruited by any Division-I programs, so the opportunity to play in the ACC—arguably the best collegiate conference—seemed out of the question.
“I didn’t even know what the path to going professional was [growing up],” Tweed-Kent said. “I knew the first step was to play on a good college team, and I didn’t think that was even a possibility.”
Instead, he was admitted to Duke based on his own academic merit. For this reason, he began his collegiate athletic career as a mere hobby, on the University’s very own club soccer team.
Quickly though, he began to desire higher athletic achievements. After communicating his interest with head coach John Kerr, he, along with his identical twin brother Daniel, was granted a spring-semester tryout for the varsity team. Kerr decided to offer both Tweed-Kents spots on the team after the initial trial period, citing their “work ethic” and “effort” as their biggest assets. The head coach resonates those claims even today.
“They have an incredible work-rate and appetite to train hard and be intense,” he said. “That’s what really attracted me. At worst, they could have improved the level of practice. I would never have predicted the standing of both Chris and Dan at this stage of their careers. It’s remarkable how well each of them has done.”
Still, Chris was just a walk-on. The transition to simply making the team pales in comparison to that of becoming a professional prospect. Although he believes he was initially looked down upon, he viewed his situation as an opportunity to impress instead of adopting a “chip-on-my-shoulder” type of attitude.
“I think [being a walk-on] is nice because there’s no pressure, no expectations,” Tweed-Kent said. “I do the best that I can, and that’s more than what anybody expects. [Other recruits] have been playing at a higher level their entire lives, whereas I made a bit of a jump. I’m still raw.”
To be certain, Chris has proven his ability to compete on that “higher level.” Since joining the team as a sophomore, he has started in nearly every contest for the team.
He only realized that he wanted, or had the skill, to pursue professional soccer after his breakout junior year, however, when he tied for the ACC lead in total assists. His nine assists this season rank him atop the conference yet again, and Kerr says Tweed-Kent now has “a future in professional soccer if he wants it.”
That junior summer, when his classmates were vying for pre-professional internships, he decided to pursue his dream and play for the Carolina Dynamo of the USL Professional Development League. This experience allowed him to measure his abilities against other MLS hopefuls and impress the frequenting professional recruiters.
“At the end of junior year is when I thought [professional soccer] was something I wanted to seriously pursue,” Tweed-Kent said. “I decided to commit to it, and that’s why this summer I played soccer instead of going to Wall Street or a consulting firm.”
That is not to say he was unqualified for a Wall Street or consulting job. In fact, one could argue that Chris is more-than-qualified for a host of careers. Though playing soccer is a tremendous time commitment, he has allowed himself to expand his college experience past the soccer field and build strong relationships throughout the entire Duke community.
“Chris and Dan were two of the most friendly people in the entire hall,” senior Sonya Kothadia, who lived with the twins in Blackwell freshman year, said. “Their presence helped other people open up and get to know each other. They always seemed busy and going somewhere, but that never meant that they did not stop by to say hello.”
In person, he passionately describes his other commitments on campus, such as serving as the co-President of ChangeEducate, a non-profit start-up that aims to teach students about poverty and encourage them to lead social change. Or he will talk about his DukeEngage trip to Santiago, Chile, the summer after his sophomore year. He is more guarded about his successful academic career, though—he boasts a 3.84 GPA as a mechanical engineer in the Pratt School of Engineering.
“I’ve done well, but I think it’s because I’m interested in it,” Tweed-Kent said. “The reason I’ve been able to balance all these things is that I truly enjoy everything I do. At times, I am definitely stressed and overworked, but at the same time, I’m doing all the things that I want to be doing.”
His hard work has paid off. In recent months, he has taken part in the more traditional job recruiting process, garnering offers from such prestigious consulting firms as Bain and Deloitte, in addition to being in the midst of interviewing with Accenture. Instead of accepting an offer immediately after graduation, however, including the possibility to join Dan at Bain, his mentality is straightforward. Soccer comes first. He has even chosen to graduate early this December—a decision that requires him to take a required engineering capstone class at N.C. State during this soccer season just to be able to participate in spring preseason workouts for whichever MLS club drafts him.
“I have a lot of different [professional interests], and you can only play soccer for so many years,” Tweed-Kent said. “So my interest is to pursue soccer for as long as I can, and for as long as it’s worthwhile. After that, I look forward to a career in many other things. This won’t be my only career, but if I could make it a career, I would. Everything else can come later.”
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