Bernard Lueken was such a talented high school football player he was awarded a full-ride football scholarship from the University of Kansas. Almost two years later, in the middle of his Big 12 Conference college football career, he shocked everyone when he decided to leave the team and the university to enlist in the United States Marine Corps.
Lueken, who played two seasons for Kansas, attributes the decision to his mother, who was one of the first women Marines to graduate from boot camp after it was designed to replicate men's training. She served six years in the Corps, and when she lost her battle to breast cancer when he was 14 years old, Lueken says from that point on he wanted to live up to her legacy and make her proud.
Lueken says his mother taught him the principles of the Marine Corps such as loyalty, dedication and to stand for something bigger then yourself. After his mother died, he focused on sports, but his military dreams never left him. He wanted to do something that would make a real difference. He could no longer ignore the voice in his head that kept telling him to follow in his mother's footsteps and join the Corps. In an interview, Pvt. Lueken, 21, who recently graduated from boot camp and is now stationed at Camp Pendleton, told me he has no regrets:
