Faith’s Favorite: Christian Marshall

Photo+caption%3A+Christian+Marshall+has+made+his+mark+at+Faith+Lutheran+in+many+ways.+Credit%3A+Nevada+Preps%2C+Inside+Lacrosse

Photo caption: Christian Marshall has made his mark at Faith Lutheran in many ways. Credit: Nevada Preps, Inside Lacrosse

He’s a two-sport star, a regular on the scholar list, has a popular video about himself with almost 84,000 views on YouTube, an Air Force commit since he was a freshman, the homecoming king, and quite possibly Faith’s most famous student-athlete of all time. No other than Christian Marshall, a star lacrosse and football player for Faith Lutheran, who sports a nice 3.93 GPA and has plans to save people’s lives as a Combat Rescue Officer in the Air Force. All these great things would make it easy for Christian to give himself all the credit, but instead of he,”attributes all my success to God and my parents.”

The first time his name entered the lacrosse world was when Christian was in seventh grade, playing for the West Coast Starz, a travel lacrosse team. In his famous video, he runs through six people on his way to score, making him a known commodity in the lacrosse world due to him making moves that people had scarcely seen from a player of his age. From there, the hype progressed so much that at one point, he was called the best middle school lacrosse player in the nation.

After that, around his eighth grade to freshman year, he received lots of contact from Division 1 college lacrosse coaches, but narrowed his choices down to Michigan and the Air Force Academy. He eventually chose the Air Force due to its, “free top tier education, military pay while you attend, and [the ability to] serve this country”, said Marshall.

Jeremy pushed me to be a better lacrosse player and unknowingly pushed me to be a better person. Ever since then Jeremy has inspired me to look at every day like it’s my last and make every moment count when I’m on the field or off.

— Christian Marshall

Once he entered high school, he instantly made an impact on the athletic field, starting on both the varsity lacrosse and football teams his freshman year, helping Faith win its first state championship for football, and showed the Las Vegas community that he was here to make an impact in not one sport, but two. All seemed to be going great for him, and nothing seemed to be going wrong.

However, a few years down the road on January 26, 2015, his life changed forever. Jeremy Huber, commonly regarded as the best defensemen to ever come out of the state of Nevada, who briefly played for Johns Hopkins University, one of the premier Division 1 lacrosse programs, died one night of pneumonia complications in his dorms while sleeping. Christian found out the next morning in his American Literature class, and began, “balling my eyes out”. He remembers this as the moment that truly changed his life. “Jeremy pushed me to be a better lacrosse player and unknowingly pushed me to be a better person. Ever since then Jeremy has inspired me to look at every day like it’s my last and make every moment count when I’m on the field or off.”

Around the same time as the tragic death of Jeremy, he started to consider playing football in college, due to several successful seasons on the gridiron, and wanted to possibly play for an Ivy League school. Even though that never came to fruition, he still desires to play for Air Force’s football team after his plebe year at the Academy.

Christian faced more adversity when he injured his ankle the first game of this past football season, and played though it the entire season, fighting the immense pain that came along with the injury. After his season ended, he contemplated getting surgery on it, but declined due to the fact that he would miss his last season of lacrosse playing for Faith. In the end, he has decided on going to the Air Force Academy Prep School to further rehab his ankle, before heading off to begin his journey in the military.

No matter what adversity he has faced, from the death of one of his closest friends, to staying up till 3 a.m. to finish homework, or dealing with his ankle injury during his final high school season in both football and lacrosse, he believes that it all is in God’s plan for him, and one can clearly see that many great things are in store for him ahead. With this patriot, star athlete, and classroom stud,”following God’s plan for my life” the sky is the limit for what Christian can do to change the world.