Note: This article contains spoilers about “Love Is Blind” Season 10.
One of the “Love Is Blind” season 10 contestants is a former collegiate soccer goalie and MLS second-round draft pick from Westlake, Ohio.
Alex Henderson, who now works in financial sales, bonded with contestant Ashley Carpenter and was one of seven couples to leave the “pods” engaged during the reality TV series.
Years before the show, Henderson was a college soccer star who played in multiple NCAA Tournaments and was a second-round draft pick in the 2017 MLS SuperDraft.
Henderson sparked some drama in the sixth and latest episode of the series when he told fellow contestant Brittany Wicker that she is more his “usual type” than Ashley at a couples pool party after the pods in Cabo, Mexico.
“I do like darker features, I like certain things in my woman,” Henderson told Wicker about his fiancée in the episode on Netflix. “I’m still trying to gauge whether the physical matches the emotional [connection]. … I’m comfortable saying, ‘OK, it’s not it.’ And I don’t have a problem with it. I will break your heart to your face.”
Where did ‘Love Is Blind’ season 10 contestant Alex Henderson play soccer?
Henderson, previously known as Alec Ferrell, graduated from Westlake High School and played collegiate soccer at Wake Forest from 2012-16. A goalkeeper, he played in 63 matches and registered 5,874 minutes, according to the school’s athletic site.
Henderson, then known as Ferrell, redshirted his freshman year and played in 10 games in his second year. He became the full-time starting goalie in his redshirt sophomore year and recorded four shutouts in 19 games with a 0.731 save percentage.
His production increased in his junior and senior seasons. Henderson had 0.846 and 0.862 save percentages in those years, while the Demon Deacons had a record of 26-5-3 with Henderson in net.
In 2015, the Demon Deacons were the No. 1 seed in the ACC tournament but were beat 1-0 by Notre Dame. Henderson saved three shots and allowed one goal against the Fighting Irish.
Wake Forest was a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament and made it to the Elite Eight before losing to Stanford 2-1. In the first two matches of the tournament, Henderson allowed no goals and had eight saves.
The following year, the Demon Deacons were the No. 2 seed in the ACC tournament, winning three games to take the ACC crown for the second time in program history. The future reality star had 15 saves in those games and allowed two goals.
Wake Forest was a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Henderson was injured in pregame warmups ahead of the team’s first playoff match, according to a Wake Forest game recap. Without him, Wake Forest pushed into the Final Four. He started the match against Denver and gave up one goal while making three saves in the Demon Deacons’ 2-1 double-overtime victory.
While the Ohio native helped Wake Forest make the national championship game, he did not play in the final. Wake Forest lost in penalty kicks against Stanford after 110 minutes of scoreless play.
Did ‘Love Is Blind’ season 10 contestant Alex Henderson play in Major League Soccer?
Henderson revealed the story of his MLS draft process on the third episode of “Love Is Blind” season 10, revealing that he had four knee surgeries at the “wrong time.”
“Draft day was the worst day of my life,” Henderson told future fiancée Carpenter.
Instead of flying to Los Angeles for the draft, Henderson said, he was sitting on a couch with his college soccer teammates with a leg in a cast and was on Percocet, presumably for knee pain.
“I was supposed to be a top-five pick, most likely a top-10, realistically,” Henderson said on the episode.
In the end, Henderson was drafted in the second round with the No. 23 pick by Minnesota United FC, but was never signed by the team.
“It was not exactly how I dreamt it up,” Henderson said. “The fourth knee surgery came through after the team that drafted me said, ‘Hey, you’re not going to play again.’ “
Afterward, Henderson transitioned to a life after his athletic career.
“You can imagine that mental kind of aspect when you lose what you had been working for, for that long. It’s very, very difficult to overcome. But when you get through that and spend the time to actually develop as a person outside of just being an athlete. … So I think that’s one of my better accomplishments, realistically.”
When do the next episodes of ‘Love Is Blind’ season 10 come out?
The net three episodes of “Love Is Blind” release on Feb. 18, featuring Henderson and his fiancée Carpenter.
