U.S. Soccer Star Kicked His Way to the Top

June 17, 2006 — -- In East Texas, football stars are as common as oil wells and cattle ranches. The nocturnal football ritual in the Lone Star state known as "Friday Night Lights" is a beacon for every boy growing up in the state but it is not a place you'd expect to find a soccer star.

Meet Clint Dempsey, the man who has soccer fans from Angola to Tobago trying to pronounce the name of his small Texas hometown: Nacogdoches.

But Dempsey's background is just one reason this 23-year-old midfielder for the U.S. national team stands out.

"Clint brings something to the team that pretty much nobody does," said Landon Donovan, who also plays on the U.S national soccer team.

He is a dervish of creative moves on the field. He's also fountain of freestyle rhymes off the field. What was once a way to kill time on long road trips has made him soccer's Eminem.

But rap music is just one outlet of self-expression -- his goal celebration dances are another.

"I think the fans want to see that it's fun," Dempsey said. "They want to see you just as excited as they are about the goal that's being scored."

His exuberance becomes all the more endearing when you discover the grind he's endured to get here.

Growing up in a trailer park with four siblings, Clint Dempsey learned the game from Hispanic neighbor kids in the pasture dust.

Seeing his talent and desire, his parents put a quarter of a million miles on the family car so he could play in a decent league in Dallas, which was three hours in each direction for every practice. That put a strain on the family's finances.

"As far as materialistic things, everything as far as what we had purchased came to a halt," Clint's mother, Debbie Dempsey, said. "We weren't going to really be able to purchase more things."

But Clint Dempsey wasn't the only athlete in the family. His older sister, Jennifer, showed promise on the tennis court, and Clint had to give up his trips to pay for hers.

The sacrifice was a huge blow to the emerging soccer star, but nothing compared to what came next. Jennifer Dempsey died tragically of a brain aneurysm at age 16. Her grave appears in Clint Dempsey's music video. And it was there he made a promise: that every goal he scored would be dedicated to her.