Meet Peter Kingston, Sounders Midfielder and Son of the Seattle Soccer System
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Seattle Sounders midfielder Peter Kingston reacts to a play during a Concacaf Champions Cup against the Vancouver Whitecaps on Thursday, March 12, 2026 at BC Place in Vancouver, B.C., Canada. (Jane Gershovich / Sounders FC Communications) [/caption]
RENTON, Wash. - The Seattle Sounders have been lauded around Major League Soccer as the standard of homegrown player development in the United States. With talent like Obed Vargas of Alaska and Georgi Minoungou of Burkina Faso starting their pro careers with the Sounders and their MLS Next Pro side Tacoma Defiance, Seattle has managed to pull in nearly $6 million in transfer fees for four homegrown players in the past few months.
But some of the most impactful Sounders are actually from the Emerald City and its surrounding area.
The team's leading scorer this season, Paul Rothrock, hails from Seattle, while the club's all-time leading scorer, Jordan Morris, is from across the I-90 bridge on Mercer Island. With head coach Brian Schmetzer of Lake City and a former Sounder himself prioritizing local talent, the Sounders have become a beacon for all nearby talent to work toward.
"Any kid who probably grew up in the Seattle area that wanted to be a Sounder, like you don't want to just be a part of the team, you want to be a guy who's well-known amongst your peers," Peter Kingston, who splits time with the Defiance and Sounders, told The Spectrum after training on Friday morning.
Kingston, who comes from just across 520 and up the 405 in Kirkland, has worked through every local avenue possible to tab his first MLS minutes with Seattle in 2025. The 24-year-old has played for the two prominent collegiate programs in the state, Seattle University and the University of Washington.
Amid the rush of college athletics, Kingston had a unique experience. He had a daughter during his three seasons with Seattle U and a son while at UW with his girlfriend, Shay.
Wanting to stay close and knowing how elite the local soccer scene is, Kingston chose to spend his summers at a prominent USL League Two upstart side, Ballard FC. Kingston quickly became a superstar for the team, netting a championship-clinching free-kick goal at Starfire Stadium in Tukwila in 2023.
After some memorable moments in college, Kingston returned to Defiance in 2025 and earned his first call-ups to the Sounders as a result. In 2026, Kingston was thrust into action with early-season injuries, notching his first career MLS start against San Jose.
Days later in Spokane, Kingston subbed on late in the second half of a Concacaf Round of 16 bout with Vancouver and made his case for more time with the first team. He delivered two assists in just over 20 minutes on the pitch, helping Seattle secure a 2-1 win.
After the game, Schmetzer beamed about his Defiance call-up.
"The kid puts everything into the game," Schmetzer said. "I'll talk to (Sounders governor) Adrian (Hanauer) and (GM) Craig (Waibel), we'll find a spot for him."
While Kingston is still working for that spot weeks later, Schmetzer reaffirmed the desire he has to make the versatile winger a mainstay in Renton.
"We're working on a few things," Schmetzer said on Friday of a deal for Kingston, as Charlotte FC loanee Nikola Petkovic would tear his right ACL just a day later in training to create more depth needs. "In my opinion, he deserves a chance to play because he can be signed even after the ]March 26 transfer] window closes."
If there's one thing you can say about Kingston’s case to be signed, it's that he's put the time in with the organization.
He joined the Sounders' academy at 13 years old, playing at various youth organizations like Outliers, Tynecastle and FC Lions. From a young age, the eastside native got an idea of how serious youth soccer can get in Washington state.
As he worked through his time at Lake Washington High School in Kirkland while balancing academy play, Kingston was introduced to the Defiance. He trained for the USL Championship side, making two starts with USL side Sounders 2 in 2018 before moving on to Tacoma for three starts in 2019.`
When deciding on a college program to attend, Kingston had his eyes set on the bright lights of the Pac-12 program at Montlake in UW. But he was lacking the grades necessary to make the move, and decided instead to commit to Seattle U. He did so as part of an agreement with his best friend from the Sounders Academy in Christian Koontz, who went on to play four years with the team after a gap year.
"A lot of former academy guys that I played with ended up going to Seattle U. And then just connecting with the coaching staff, and then the build-out style of play, which I feel like kind of suited me pretty well," Kingston said.
In terms of the coaching fit, Seattle U's men's soccer program was run by a local legend in head coach Pete Fewing. Fewing, a former UW player in the 80s, coached Seattle U from 1988 to 2005 before returning to the team from 2012 to 2023 as it returned to Division I athletics. Professionally, Fewing played for FC Seattle Storm of the WSL from 1985 to 1990.
Most relevant of all, Fewing had a longstanding connection to the Sounders by way of being part of their broadcast production team since their first MLS season in 2009. Fewing had already overseen one former Redhawk, Alex Roldan, make the jump to the Sounders.
"I've watched some SU games, I'd seen Peter, I know he's an academy product. (Fewing) does a good job of promoting his players, but Peter has been here throughout various levels within the organization," Schmetzer said on Tuesday morning.
The Redhawks went 26-22-3 in three years with Kingston, winning the Western Athletic Conference in 2021 before losing in the first round of the NCAA tournament. Kingston started 39 games in that span, scoring two goals with five assists.
Off the field, he had his first child and was set to navigate fatherhood at just 20 years old.
“Early on, when I was in college, I think my parents saw that I might struggle a little bit with it, but it really just came down to my girlfriend helping me out a lot,” Kingston said.
With his ability to impact winning at the Division I level apparent and his grades improved, Kingston had the chance to make the move to Montlake.
While Seattle U had a history of being a top-25 squad in the country, its status in the WAC meant the team would typically need to win its league's playoffs to make it to the NCAA tournament.
At UW, however, the Pac-12 was full of historically great programs like Stanford, meaning more chances at at-large bids and postseason success.
It was a no-brainer for Kingston.
"I just wanted to play against bigger teams, and it was a dream of mine to go to U-Dub and attend that school," he said.
In the offseason before his final season with SU, however, a new opportunity presented itself.
Newly formed USL League Two side Ballard FC was making waves for pulling in local collegiate talent during the summers, and Kingston saw another opportunity to get game reps with the squad. Considering his off-field circumstances, the decision was easy for Kingston to stay local.
"There was only one local team," Kingston said of Ballard FC. "My girlfriend was pregnant, and I was about to have a daughter. My daughter was born in June and the Ballard season started in May, so I needed to be in this area. Otherwise, it would complicate things for me."
With the team, which he started with in the summer of 2022 and stayed with until 2024, Kingston emerged as a star and fan-favorite.
As a midfielder at Seattle U, Kingston had posted seven goal contributions across three seasons. In three seasons and 50 games with Ballard FC, with plenty of familiar academy players, Kingston posted 32 goal contributions — 22 of which were assists. No contribution was more valuable than the free-kick goal he scored to win Ballard its first championship in stoppage time in 2023.
“It was kind of like a reunion… Ballard became a family, it became a home for me,” Kingston said. “Ballard gave us a platform not only to grow our personal brand, but also to play at a high level.”
With the exhilaration of Ballard's win behind him, Kingston turned his attention back to UW. Though he was happy to be donning the purple and gold, Kingston would have to face the music early after transferring.
With his first Pac-12 season looming, the final weeks of non-league play saw the Huskies travel to Championship Field in First Hill to face Seattle U in a matchup dubbed the Fewing Cup for the coach's connection to both programs. Though Fewing had just stepped down as skipper of the Redhawks, not a single fan wearing red forgot that his former recruit in Kingston had left them for a crosstown rival.
The small venue was filled with chants of "traitor!" as Kingston looked for an opening as his team trailed 2-1. Indeed, he found the equalizer in the 60th, though his side would go on to lose to Seattle U 3-2 for the first time since 2018.
"I was hyped up," Kingston said, remembering the derby fondly.
In the ensuing postseason, the Huskies would get their revenge over Seattle U, eliminating the Redhawks at home in the opening round of the tournament on penalties. In his second and final collegiate season with UW, Kingston scored a career-high six goals with five assists, giving himself a fighting chance of attracting professional attention.
A year after his graduation, the same Huskies team Kingston poured his heart into lifted their first NCAA trophy.
Kingston, who had a son during his two seasons with the Huskies, wouldn't have scripted his collegiate career any other way.
"Playing for Seattle U and U-Dub was just a dream come true. Like I was a local kid, grew up in Kirkland … going to Seattle U, a private institution, getting my education there, it was awesome," Kingston, now a first-generation college graduate, said. "As a little kid, I always wanted to be a Husky. Couldn't get in as a high schooler, and then having that opportunity to get in later on … just a dream come true."
Despite his success with Ballard and a relatively strong finish at UW, Kingston was not selected in the 2025 MLS Superdraft. Instead, he would sign with the Defiance and try the path less traveled as an undrafted talent.
Kingston started 24 games for Defiance in 2025, notching two goals and six assists as his playmaking earned him more minutes. As is typical with the very connected Defiance and Sounders rosters, Kingston trained with the first team plenty during his first season with Tacoma.
It all culminated in an October call-up when Kingston played 11 minutes as a sub against Real Salt Lake. With Seattle thin at center back with Hassani Dotson dealing with a lingering concussion in the early stages of 2026, Kingston was thrust into action next to USMNT talent Cristian Roldan in Seattle’s defending midfield.
He came on late during Seattle's 3-0 stomping of Vancouver in the Concacaf Round of 16 first round before netting 85 minutes vs. San Jose in his first MLS start days later. On March 18, Kingston subbed in on the right wing and delivered assists to leading scorer Paul Rothrock and striker Danny Musovski in just 25 minutes to manufacture a comeback win in the second leg vs. Vancouver in Spokane.
"He's got a real ability to him, like a good striker of the ball, technical. But he also comes hard into a tackle, and I think that's a good thing as a Sounder," Rothrock, a former Defiance man himself, said of Kingston. "The key to him having success right now is staying patient, and he's doing all the right things."
Before ever playing a minute for the Sounders first team, Kingston had contributed to high-level winning at three of the city's most prized soccer establishments. While he may not have spent his whole youth career in the Sounders' program, Kingston has shown an "it" factor on just about every level below the MLS.
With Georgi Minoungou's transfer to Denver and the loss of Nikola Petkovic to injury, now might be as good a time as any for Kingston to step up to the first team and complete his soccer quest across western Washington.
"I know that with where I'm going and what I'm trying to do, if the cards play out right for me, like I'll be able to put my family in a better position. So just using my kids as motivation also… them just kind of seeing me as an athlete and seeing the opportunities that I've been given through playing sports."
