Kerry Abello is not your average student-athlete. In fact, for Abello, the term "student-athlete" is immensely intertwined.
Abello was selected to be one of the three captains for Penn State's 2020 Women's Soccer Team. Her plethora of achievements helped her earn that position.
Abello was named CoSIDA first-team Academic All-American, second-team All-North Region and first-team All-Big Ten honoree in 2019. As a Nittany Lion, Abello has appeared in 62 games, including all 24 games last season. In 2019, eight goals and three assists were contributed by Abello, and she has scored 15 goals and added eight assists in her career.
Despite all of her achievements on the soccer field, Abello said her family always told her and her siblings that "school comes first," and then sports—a priority that has been ingrained into her since she was young.
"Both of my parents were first generation college students and paid their own way through all of their schooling, so it was important to them to always instill that in us," Abello said. "School is what is going to get you places, and while these extracurricular activities are very important, you always need an education to fall back on. They definitely championed that from my childhood, and it stuck with me for sure."
But Abello did not need to choose which part of the term "student-athlete" is more important than the other. Abello naturally allows the term "student-athlete" to balance each other out due to her intense work ethic.
"I do a lot of things with the utmost intensity, Abello said. "I am a perfectionist, which is not shocking to anyone. I pride myself on doing everything to the best of my ability."
Abello is a Schreyer Honors student, majoring in biological life sciences and Spanish. The ultimate goal of hers is to graduate from medical school and treat patients who generally can only speak Spanish. In addition, Abello has been a part of a biomedical engineering lab on campus for the past two years.
In the lab, Abello researches cancer cells, and plans to write her Schreyer Honors Thesis on her findings. In particular, Abello will be looking at the lineage of cancer cells and their ability to produce an oncogenic signal that will become cancerous.
"I have 12 different cell lines," Abello said. "I am going to run some experiments on them hopefully when I get cleared to be in the lab again, and that will kind of be the basis of my thesis."
To put into perspective of how challenging and rare it is to be in the Schreyer Honors College while being a student-athlete, The Schreyer Honors College reported 1,990 enrolled scholars—according to their 2018-2019 academic review. Penn State's comprehensive and successful athletic program features 800 student-athletes—and Abello belongs to both exclusive, time-consuming and hardworking programs.
Abello said she has acquired valuable traits and learned many lessons from both academics and athletics, which she uses in both commitments interchangeably.
"I think the two are so intertwined, more than I even realize, and the skills I have learned from both play into all facets of my life," Abello said. "Soccer from a very young age has always taught me a lot of amazing traits, like teamwork is definitely one of them, but also dedication and time commitment to a specific thing. I think that has definitely helped me in the classroom."
"Being really competitive in soccer carries over to my academics, whether that is a good thing or not," Abello said. "I definitely compete with myself a lot, including even in my research. I am always trying to be better, and I think that kind of drive bounces back and forth between soccer and school all the time."
Abello said she is taught in her courses and research lab to be more analytical, and to "think outside the box," which has allowed her to carry that inquisitiveness into leadership as a captain.
As long as Abello could remember, she said her intense work ethic has always been an important facet of her life. Growing up, Abello was a competitive gymnast in addition to playing soccer, and she said she has always been a busy child.
"I would go straight from gymnastics practice to soccer practice, and my life has just always been chaotic in that way," Abello said. "But I think it is very natural to me, and I would not have it any other way. I think if it weren't like that, I would be lost."
"I am definitely comfortable in the chaos," Abello said.
A small part of the secret to Abello's comfortability is a "massive" daily planner that maps out almost every detail of her day-to-day life.
"I put absolutely everything into [the planner], like all of my assignments and my soccer practices," Abello said. "I have a very detailed calendar and I plan out each week—sometimes down to the minute—which can be very stressful, but a schedule kind of keeps me on track."
Abello's planner, however, is not the only helping hand she has. Abello relies a lot on her teammates, friends and coaches to be her referees on and off the field. If Abello seems like she has been getting an inadequate amount sleep or is not as present during soccer practice, those closest to her will notice these types of behaviors and help her get back on track.
In particular, her teammate Maddie Myers, someone Abello has grown up with, plays a big factor in helping Abello not get lost in the "chaos."
"[Myers] is constantly like 'my checker,' and she balances me out," Abello said. "She is a little more easy-going, and I am super type-A and serious. She's like, 'You need to ease up a bit,' and I think she balances me out really well and is always that 'check' for me."
If one thing is true for Abello, she is always up for a challenge.
A few of her favorite honors courses that she has taken are Honors Biology 110 and Honors Organic Chemistry 212. What attracted Abello to taking an honors biology course was her love for biology—but in contrast—Abello said chemistry is not her "forte." Abello said the reason why she loved taking an honors organic chemistry course was because of how much the course challenged her in a positive manner.
"I pushed myself more than I was comfortable with," Abello said.
However, one of the most challenging achievements that Abello said she is the proudest of during her time at Penn State—that is neither related to academics or soccer—is dancing in THON this past year.
"That was the hardest experience of my life, and it was the most rewarding," Abello said. "So, that has been the most incredible thing I have been involved in outside of school and soccer as a whole."
Because of Abello's busy schedule, she said she averaged about six hours of sleep each night and had no prior preparation leading up to THON, where she stood for 46 hours to participate in the fight against childhood cancer. Abello danced with her former teammate, Sarafina Valenti, who was a dancer for THON two previous times prior to 2020's marathon.
The hours spent in the weight room and on the soccer field fortunately contributed to Abello being in enough physical shape to stand for the duration of THON—but that was not the only thing that helped her.
All of Abello's teammates visited her at some point during the 46 hours to support and encourage her. Both of her parents also flew into State College to stand with her during large portions of the 46 hours.
"Physically, it was one of the most challenging things I have ever done in my life," Abello said. "It was very hard, but I would not trade it for the world. It was the most incredible experience ever."
Because of an unusual year for sports and the delay of the 2020 fall season due to COVID-19, Abello and the other two captains, Sam Coffey and Frankie Tagliaferri, have their sights on accomplishing their main goal: Unity.
While making it to the Final Four and winning a Big Ten Championship are still significant goals of theirs when the opportunity does arise, they believe that only with unity that the Penn State Women's Soccer team will become unstoppable.
"We want to create an environment where people are so happy to be on this team and proud to represent Penn State, and also feel like they can really lean on each other and love each other," Abello said. "I think if we can foster that environment, we can do absolutely anything on the field, because we have some of the most talented players in the country on this team. So, I think that is the ultimate goal, and through that, we can really reach our soccer potential."
Abello said if someone would have asked her if she would have been chosen to be a captain when she first came to Penn State, she would tell them that they are "out of your mind." When she was named a captain this past summer, the realization of the honor, privilege and responsibility that comes with the role hit her all at once in a wave of emotion.
"I was almost moved to tears because I thought about my journey at Penn State, and I struggled a lot my freshman year—like everyone does—finding my place, and I think I have grown a lot here, and I think becoming a captain was a good summation of all of that," Abello said.
"…but also the realization that this is going to be a lot of work, and I care so much about this team, that I want to do everything I possibly can to do my best for this team—which is a stressful job—but definitely a privilege," Abello said. "I know me and the other two captains do our very best every day."
