Nine-to-five jobs aren’t for everyone. Ask women’s soccer associate head coach Chris Shaw, who tried it out after his college career was over and found he could not suppress his love for soccer. But his lifelong love of the game had one decidedly false start. Shaw started playing soccer in elementary school, but can hardly say he was in love with the game from day one. His first coach was a former Olympian track star who kept his young players on a tight workout regiment. ”We ran and ran and ran,” Shaw said. “I was like ‘this is for the birds,’ and I quit.” His second stint produced better results. His family moved around frequently as required by his father’s military career, and during a stay in Kansas, Shaw picked up soccer again. A four-year stint in Germany, where Shaw says soccer is “an institution,” only increased his passion for the sport. He played at the collegiate level for Methodist University in Fayetteville and was the recipient of two All-Dixie Conference selections and All-America honors as a senior in 1993. Meanwhile, Shaw’s future boss, Pack head coach Steve Springthorpe, was a volunteer assistant coach for the Methodist women’s team and the dorm director in the dormitory he lived in, albeit on a different floor. Shaw said while he was in college, the two rarely crossed paths, and never for disciplinary reasons. ”I was a good kid,” Shaw said. “He didn’t have to worry about me.” After graduation, he played professionally for the Raleigh Flyers and went to graduate school at East Carolina. He shifted into a nine-to-five office job arranging soccer camps, but something was missing. He found himself yearning for the day to be over so he could referee matches. ”I was always looking to get out of the office to ref,” Shaw said. “That was what I enjoyed doing and wanted to do.” Even though he never saw himself coaching, when opportunities arose at the high school level, Shaw took advantage and never looked back.  He served as head coach of Mount Olive College in Fayetteville for four years. He led a team that had won three games the previous season to a 20-3 record and a national championship, winning the 2004 CVAC Coach of the Year and setting a Division II record for a single-season turnaround in the process.  Shaw said he sees plenty of similarities between Mount Olive and State. Shaw said he and his fellow coaches prefer to build a program from the ground up, so the struggling women’s soccer program was the perfect project. ”I’d rather come into a program that’s struggling than inherit a program that’s at the top and try to keep it there,” Shaw said. “The only way you can take a struggling team is up.” When, at the recommendation of a mutual friend, Springthorpe offered him a job as an assistant coach, first at his alma mater and later at Fresno State, he took it. And when Springthorpe took the job at State, Shaw followed him back to North Carolina. Instead of cleaning house and completely overhauling the program, Springthorpe, Shaw, and assistant coach Dena Floyd decided to work on building a new mentality. Shaw says he tries to “keep it loose” on the field. ”I like to be on the field as much as I can. I like to kid around with the girls,” Shaw said. “To me, that’s fun. That’s what I look forward to, so it’s easy for me to be energetic and have fun.” Shaw still has his “nine to five” office responsibilities, heading up scouting and team academics for the Wolfpack. But the carrot at the end of his day always was, and continues to be, the chance to run around on the field, teaching the sport he loves to others. And he isn’t alone. ”There’s something about it,” Springthorpe said. “Once you immerse yourself in that lifestyle, that freedom, being outside and being involved in a sport you’ve played, you can’t really imagine doing anything else.”