Coming Home
Marcus McMaryion and Tom Hager
In Partnership with Athletes For God
I never thought I'd be sitting here in Fresno, telling you this story.
I never thought I'd be talking to you today, as Fresno State's starting quarterback, coming off a 10-win season. If you would have told me a year ago that I would come home and be a part of this amazing turn around program, I would have had a hard time believing it.
But it's amazing what is possible when God lends a helping hand.
You see, Fresno State wasn't my first stop in college football. That would be at Oregon State, where my relationship with God was the best it had ever been, but my football career seemed to be going backwards. My faith wasn't translating to the football field, and although I started a few games, I found myself getting benched multiple times. Then at a few different points in my career, it felt so overwhelming that I began to question my love for the game. You see, by this time I was demoted to third string quarterback. On a team that went 2-10.
That may seem hard to believe with the season God blessed us with last year, but back in 2015, I remember asking God what was going on.
“God, I'm doing everything right, why isn't everything else going right?”
I had to realize that God puts us through adversity, testing you to see if you're going to come out and still believe in Him through it all. Looking back, I think God was testing my faith and seeing to what extent I was willing to believe in Him. Fortunately for me, at the other end of the tunnel was Fresno State.
Before God ever let me step into Bulldog Stadium, however, He needed to know exactly what I was made of. I grew up in a Christian household, reading stories throughout the Bible of people who faced adversity, but when it actually applies to your own life it can feel unfair or overwhelming.
The funny thing is before I left Oregon State, I struggled so much to win over our head coach – who wasn't even the coach I had signed up to play for.
I signed my letter of intent in February of 2014, but ten months later the head coach who recruited me took the Nebraska job. The Beavers signed his replacement, and although my commitment had been founded upon my relationship with my first head coach, I decided to stay. I was going to be a Beaver.
That decision would ultimately cost me a few years of playing football, but made me a better person. More importantly, it made me a better Christian.
I spent the 2014 season on the scout team as a redshirt, and in 2015 I embarked on what would become two of the most turbulent years of my life. At first, things seemed to be progressing okay as I started the year as the backup.
That's when things began to unravel, and in a hurry. Fortunately by this point in my college career I had found a great group of Christian friends to surround myself with, because things were about to get a whole lot worse for me and my team before they got better.
When I arrived in Corvallis my freshman year, I didn't go to church the first few months. I had grown up in a Christian household, but when I got to college I just didn't know where to go or who to hang out with, and it wasn't until I needed a place to live for the next year that I started to regain my Christian foundation.
People were starting to clique up on the team, and as I began to look for a place to stay, I ended up stumbling into a house with four other guys on the team who also procrastinated on their living circumstances . They were people I hadn't known really well at that point, but they ended up being four guys who were strong in their faith, and helped to start a small Christian study group on the team. They ended up being the brothers that I never had and I really needed their help and God's presence in my life that year – my redshirt freshman season – because things were about to become really chaotic on the team.
As I've gotten older I've realized that God sometime uses your adversities to catapult you higher, but the way a catapult works, it has to bring you down before it can launch you forward.
The only thing was I didn't realize just how low God was going to bring the catapult of my football career before it turned around.
So, rewinding back to my redshirt football season, we were 2-1 on the year, and after our starting QB struggled in the next game against Arizona, I finally got the nod to be put in the game. It was now my time to shine....or so I thought, as we lost 44-7. That performance did not sit well with the coaching staff, because I didn't see the field the next week against Washington State. Then, in the following game against Colorado, I realized just how quickly my career had derailed off the tracks.
Not only did I not get the start, but neither did our previous starter. Our 3rd QB was the first one to see the field, but after some struggles, the coaching staff went back to my teammate who began the year as the starter. We ended up losing 17-14, which marked our fourth straight loss. We then lost our fifth game in a row against Utah, when I didn't play at all, but the low point for me might have been the next week.
We were at home in Reser Stadium, with our fans cheering us on. Unfortunately, with rain pouring down, the conditions were atrocious. So was our performance, including mine.
We walked off the field with a 41-0 loss. The last time Oregon State had been shut out at home, 18 years before, I was just a year old at that time.
Our implosion continued against Cal. We then lost our next game 52-7, which ran the losing streak to eight games, and then Oregon beat us 52-42 to send us into the offseason with nine consecutive losses.
Here's how bad things were that year...at one point we had seven quarterbacks competing for the starting spot. Seven. None of us took a firm hold of the position, and in practice you felt like you were getting one rep every 30 minutes. It can make you question if you really love football, but it can also make you question if you're even any good.
When a slump reaches nine straight games, you start to ask yourself: is this even a slump, or am I actually this bad at football?
But that's the devil trying to get you to believe in his lies.
Thanks to my roommates and the Christian study group on the team, I continued to try and do the right things on and off the field. I knew I was in the midst of the storm, but there had to be something after it. And there was, but I would have to go through one more treacherous season before that storm would pass.
Before my redshirt sophomore year began there were some QB position changes and transfers, and yet I was somehow further down on the depth chart than I was a year earlier.
Two new quarterbacks played the first six games as I didn't throw a single pass. It was only because both guys got injured that I ended up as a starter.
Our team was slightly better than we were the year before, at 2-3 and 1-1 in Pac-12 play at that point, but I unfortunately picked up right where I left off. When I took the field for the Utah game, I was 5-9 before getting benched and we lost 19-14. I still got to start the next game, but couldn't find the end zone and threw two interceptions.
That's when my perseverance finally started to pay off. We lost the next game 35-31 against Washington State, but I threw for 327 yards and two touchdowns with no picks. I started the next two games against Stanford and UCLA, and although we lost those games, I could tell I was progressing. We finished the year with wins over Arizona and Oregon, which marked the first time in eight years we beat our in-state rival.
I was ready to lead the program to new heights in 2017. Or so I thought.
Over the offseason, OSU signed a new QB, a 6-7 quarterback who was an All-American at the Junior College level. On August 1 of last year, only a week into Fall Camp, he was named as our starting quarterback.
That news was really difficult to take and hit my teammates just as much if not more. Throughout my time at OSU, as I bounced up and down the depth chart, people would ask me how I felt about my status with the program. And each time, my answer was the same: I want to stay in Corvallis.
Here's the thing though – God doesn't need you to stay in a bad situation to prove your loyalty or resiliency. Sometimes going in a new direction is exactly what God has planned for you.
I made the decision to transfer, and because I had already earned my bachelor's degree at that point, I was eligible to play at immediately wherever I decided. What's ironic is that the place I ultimately chose was literally the last place I would have gone out of high school.
When I was in playing at Dinuba High School, just 30 miles down the road from Fresno, I had interest from many schools up and down the West Coast, all except Fresno State. I was okay with that though, because being that young I wanted to get out and explore leaving my hometown area.
It's funny, though, just how much you can appreciate your home once you leave. When I decided to transfer I honestly thought some Division 2 schools would reach out to me, but I was surprised to hear from powerhouse programs too. But of all the places I could have gone, I decided to come back home.
I love Fresno. It's a big city, but it feels like a tight knit community. Everyone knows everyone, and you can't go somewhere without running into someone. I appreciate it a lot more now than I did four years ago, but what I didn't realize was just how much the people in Fresno would appreciate and support me as well.
I showed up at fall camp a week and a half before the season started, and scrambled to learn the playbook. I was still getting familiar with our plays when we had our season opener against Incarnate Word, but with our team up 36-0, our coach Jeff Tedford decided to put me in.
The reaction from the Fresno State fans blew me away.
They embraced me for coming home, and that roar of the crowd is something I'll never forget. It's not that different from our relationship with God – he's ready to welcome you with open arms at any point in your life. There is never a bad time for you to accept Christ in your heart.
It was exciting to be back in front of my hometown fans and the Valley. I only threw seven passes that game, but I completed six of them, two of which went for touchdowns.
I was still the backup when we played the next two games against powerhouse teams Alabama and Washington, but I started the next game as we beat Nevada 41-21. We then beat San Jose State, New Mexico, and San Diego State to extend our winning streak to four straight games. After losing our next game, we went on another four-game winning streak and ultimately finished the season 10-4.
One of the coolest things for me was that my football career was finally beginning to mimic my faith. Before each game starts, I do a lap around the football field. I do that to represent the story of the Walls of Jericho, when the Israelite army continued to walk around the city, covering every inch around the walls obeying God's command unsure of the outcome, until they suddenly came tumbling down.
And for me, it felt like every wall I had come upon in my career that felt like a barrier started to fall apart as well.
Even before I had turned the corner, I had accepted the fact that God already knew what was going to happen in my career and I had prayed for His will to be done. I am just blessed that His will included our team winning the West division of the Mountain West conference, winning all four of our rivalry trophies, winning 10 games, and winning the Hawaii Bowl. I went 9-2 as a starter and threw for 2,726 yards, but all the credit for that goes to God. It just shows how amazing His plan is.
I'm now getting ready for my last year of college football, and even though I hope the NFL awaits me down the road, I've found solace in the fact that my purpose in life goes beyond football. One of the athletes I look up to the most, Kobe Bryant, said if basketball is the biggest thing he's ever done than he's failed at life. I couldn't agree more.
Nobody is going to remember my stats after I'm done with football, but they'll remember how I treated people and made them feel. And the way I treat people should be a reflection of my love for God.
Someone asked me a few weeks ago what the Fresno State jersey means to me, and it means a lot. It's got my name on the back, so I'm representing my family, but it also says Fresno State on the front. I'm representing the college, the city, and the whole community. But even beyond that, we wear a V on our helmets to represent the entire San Joaquin Valley. More importantly, it symbolizes blessings that I have received and for that I am eternally humbled and thankful.
In closing, I have to say though, representing the valley sure feels funny to me. From this vantage point, after what I've been through, it sure feels like the mountain top.
God bless and Go Dogs!