Seymour’s Marine Sign with C-N

By: Lee Ramsey
lee@seymourherald.com
It was a huge day for Corbin Marine as he signed a letter-of-intent to play soccer for the Carson-Newman Eagles. All the 15 years of hard work, sacrifice and fun had paid off.
To continue his soccer career at the next level was a dream come true for Marine.
“I’ve been pushing for this all the way through high school,” he said. “I started playing at the age of 3 in AYSO when my Dad coached me all the way until high school.”
Marine talked about his high school career which led to this day, “I love every minute of high school soccer. My best memory was winning the district last year (first year in the AAA IMAC).”
His junior year Seymour was so deep with seniors, Marine had to come off the bench to contribute.
He had to go through the transition of a coaching change after his sophomore year going form Coach Bobby Norwood to Drew Payne. Norwood currently coaches at Sevier County High School. The two coaching philosophies were totally different.
“Coach Norwood teaches the English style while Payne coaches the Brazil style which is a possession style,” Marine said.
Marine went on to talk about his decision to go to Carson-Newman College.
“I made my decision in March after visiting,” he said. “Coach (Richard) Moody called in February. He came from Morristown East to Carson-Newman the year before. He had seen me play for Seymour when we played Morristown East. He called me when he changed jobs to Carson-Newman.
“Carson-Newman is a great environment. I liked all the players and I loved the coach and the city.”
Other schools showing interest were North Carolina Upstate and Tennessee Wesleyan.
Soccer has always been a family affair starting at a very young age for Marine.
“I worked at the soccer park so I was able to get him (Corbin) started one year early in soccer,” Corbin’s dad Marvin Marine said. “He followed his brothers as they grew up, and he wanted to be as good as they were. He really pursued soccer.
“You can really tell when a kid is real young what they play with, like a ball, a doll, or a car. His was a ball from birth. So that’s his toy. He’s always pursued that. That was his big thing.”
The Marines have made soccer a priority through the years as Marvin, his wife, Donna and the rest of the family spent a tone of time and money on soccer traveling teams and camps.
“We traveled from state to state in competition with him in competitive soccer. That was awesome. It was the next level. We spent our vacation money on our boys; that was our mini-vacations,” Marvin said.
According to Marvin, Marine played for Blount United and FC Alliance among others to “help prepare him for this day.”
“As s parent, I couldn’t be any prouder,” Marvin said. “I’ve succeeded in raising my children, now we’ve got to move to the next level. It’s a dream come true for him and us. I didn’t realize we’d be standing here a couple of years ago, but here we are.”
Marine’s high school coach, Seymour’s Drew Payne spoke highly of Marine.
“He’s been a pleasure to coach the last couple of years,” Payne said. “Last year he had sort of a monumental season sort of a stepping stone season as far as moving into a very important roll on the team to have that kind of leadership as a junior, playing the position that he plays at defensive mid. So much goes through him defensively and offensively and he fit into the role nicely.
“He was Co-Captain this year and stepped right into a leadership role. He had a very solid season with 7 goals and 7 assists. Corbin took a load on his shoulders. He has a very solid future in front of him. He knows the game and is the most in shape kid I’ve ever seen.
“He needs to take that and get better and learn from Coach Moody. He’ll fit in nicely. He’s still got some years of soccer left. He’ll develop into his own player. Having those intangibles really helps at the next level.”
The Seymour Herald would like to wish Corbin Marine good luck in college. He is an Eagle for life (in this case a double Eagle).