When most people think of high school quarterbacks, they generally aren’t picturing the toughest guy on the field. If one of those guys breaks a finger on their throwing hand halfway through the season, they’re done for. Put them on the sideline. Let them hold a clipboard and cheer on their teammates.
North Hall High School senior quarterback Tanner Marsh takes exception to that notion. Matter of fact, he is an exception to that notion.
WHO IS TANNER MARSH?
If you ask the guy himself, he’ll quickly tell you he was born in Athens and moved to Smyrna. Then, in second grade, he moved again to the North Hall area.
He’s the youngest of the three kids – he has a brother and sister and his sister is getting married.
His parents are divorced and have both remarried and he loves both of the people his parents married.
He’s not a homebody. He’s always making plans to get out of the house and hang out with friends on the golf course or the lake.
He’s a self-professed “alright” golfer with a personal best score of 88, but finding time to play is keeping him from getting better. When asked about the game, he plays because his dad does and he’s just trying to “get like him.”
If you ask senior linebacker Zeke Harris, Marsh is a leader.
Senior tight end Breckan Kirby says he’s a guy who will cut up with you when it’s time, but “knows when to lock in and get the job done.”
To senior wide receiver Ryals Puryear, he’s “more like a brother than anything else.”
Head coach Sean Pender sums up Marsh in a single word: Dude!
THE CHANGE
Pender took over at North Hall in January 2022 and, before that – as a sophomore – Marsh was a wide receiver with aspirations of throwing passes instead of catching them.
“All this stuff happened and Pender came and I was like, ‘OK, here’s my shot. Let’s go see if I can make it happen,’” Marsh said. “When Pender got here, we started working and I started seeing progression.”
Pender said he was expecting Marsh to be an outside linebacker or a tight end going into his junior year.
Actually, Pender was looking at other candidates to fill that starting quarterback slot.
“I was looking at other kids to play quarterback,” Pender said. “He wasn’t really high on my radar in the very beginning as a quarterback. He was high on my radar as a kid that worked really hard.”
That work ethic bought Marsh a chance. When he approached Pender with the idea, the Trojans’ new head coach gave him a shot.
“He just kept improving and getting better and better and better,” Pender said. “By the end of summer last year, he won the starting job.”
THE START
In his first game as the starter, North Hall lost to White County, 35-14, in Cleveland.
Marsh completed 14-of-25 attempts for 128 yards and he threw an interception. On the ground, he was his team’s leading rusher in the contest with 12 carries for 91 yards and a touchdown.
In Marsh’s words, the game “was a nightmare.”
In his home opener, Marsh was 11-of-24 for 171 yards, two touchdowns and an interception. The Trojans lost 30-13.
Maybe the third game is the charm? Not this time.
North Hall fell 38-20 to Walnut Grove at home.
Marsh threw for 150 yards and a touchdown and ran for another score. The silver lining – no interception.
Then the cross-county rivalry with East Hall put the Trojans back on the road.
“East Hall hit and I was like ‘Alright, let’s see if I can make something happen,’” Marsh said. “I remember coming into that game with not really any kind of mentality, just trying to prove myself, honestly. I did very good there.”
Marsh connected on 10-of-15 passes for 192 yards, three scores and an interception. On the ground, he added 72 yards and two touchdowns.
In a hard-fought game against Cherokee Bluff, Marsh threw a touchdown to Puryear and ran for another. The Trojans won 14-12.
THE BREAK
With a 2-3 record, 1-1 in region play, North Hall traveled to Bogart to play North Oconee.
“They were definitely an intimidating team, but you never want to go into any game with doubt,” Marsh said.
Marsh said his offense was shut down on the first drive. Then on the second drive they had a “great drive and scored.”
It was the third drive when his junior season would be altered.
“Things are starting to click. He’s starting to find his rhythm,” Kirby said. “Then he breaks his hand.”
“I think it was on a third down play,” Marsh said. “I tried to scramble out and my finger got caught in a face mask. I tried to push him down on the ground and then snap.”
ACCEPTANCE
With adrenaline pumping, Marsh didn’t feel his finger break.
When the Titans got the stop, the offense went to the sideline to prepare for their next drive.
“I went on the sideline and my finger was completely going the other way,” Marsh said. “I’m trying not to freak out. I was trying to bend it like everything’s going to be alright.”
As the reality of his season potentially being over settled in, Marsh said the first 15 minutes were “pretty sad” knowing he couldn’t be out on the field helping his team.
“It was devastating for us,” Puryear said. “Right after that, we’re on the sidelines and defense is out there, so I had time to process it. I look over and see Walker (Davis) and I’m like, ‘OK, Tanner’s hurt, he’s down, but we’ve still got to play. We’ve still got a game going on.’
Davis, the team’s backup quarterback, was a freshman at the time.
After sitting around on the sidelines for a bit thinking about his situation, Marsh helped his team the only way he could.
“I thought, ‘Oh shoot, Walker’s in. That’s a freshman at quarterback against North Oconee. I need to go do something. I can’t keep sitting here looking at this hand,’” Marsh said.
Marsh became Pender’s shadow on the sideline. When a play call went in from the head coach, the junior was there talking to the freshman. In timeouts, Marsh was there coaching up the youngster the best he could in the moment and giving words of encouragement.
Davis only threw the ball seven times for 16 yards in the game. The Trojans were held to 55 rushing yards and they lost the game, 70-7.
A “DUDE”
The next day, Marsh went to the doctor and got his finger set and arm in a cast. The whole weekend he was talking to Pender figuring out what he can do to help his team now.
“The doctor said it was going to be a six or seven week injury. I was out the rest of the season for sure,” Marsh said. “[Pender and I] talked on the phone, Madison (County) was a big region game we needed to win.”
“We had a group chat last year, I think it was the Saturday after the game and he went and got a cast on it and was like ‘I’m coming to play defense,’” Harris recalled. “We were all like, ‘Oh, you’re just joking.’”
Monday, Marsh showed up with a cast on his arm. Since he couldn’t throw the ball, he would get it wrapped up into a big “club” and made the switch to play linebacker.
“Instead of breaking his hand and sulking, he clubs it up and goes and plays the rest of the year on the defensive side of the ball,” Pender said. “When you’ve got a quarterback that has that type of mentality and a team-first like, ‘You know what, I’m not letting my team down. If I can’t throw the ball, I could go out there and stop somebody from scoring.’ He just had that kind of mentality.
“That’s the kind of kid you want to lead your team,” he continued.
Marsh said he spent the whole first week just soaking up all he could about the defensive side of the ball.
“He was really good. Just had a feel for the game,” Kirby said. “He knew where to be at the right time.”
In his first game on defense, Marsh tied for the team-high in solo tackles, was third in total tackles, registered a sack and forced two fumbles.
He finished the season with 23 total tackles in those final four games.
“When I say he’s a dude, you have people that have an ‘it’ factor about them, you know who they are when they walk in the room,” Pender said. “Tanner, he has that type of leadership mentality. When he opens his mouth, the team listens. He’s got the respect of his teammates.”
THE LEADER
When Marsh made the decision to club up and flip to the defensive side of the ball and help his team at all costs, that helped him gain that respect.
“That just shows he’s willing to do whatever it takes to get a win for the team,” Kirby said. “He’s willing to club up his hand, tape it all up and get out there and get the job done.”
Outside of making that switch, Marsh is also very uplifting to his teammates when they make mistakes like missing blocks or dropping passes. The lack of negativity draws his teammates to him.
“Whenever we’re at practice or in a game, no matter what, if we’re having a good game or a bad game, he’s always talking to us and lifting everybody up,” Puryear said. “Whenever we’re having bad days, bad games, he’ll come up to us one-on-one and just be like, ‘Dude, you’re doing great. Calm down, relax.’ Just words of encouragement.”
Pender said it really doesn’t matter the situation and what his teammates do.
“We have a pretty tough coaching staff. We, as coaches, ride our players pretty tough and demand a lot out of them,” Pender said. “Tanner, when a receiver drops a pass – Tanner could be under duress, scrambling around and drop a dime to a receiver and the receiver could drop it. Where a lot of quarterbacks would get frustrated and say something to the receiver in a negative manner, Tanner never does that.”
THE RETURN
Marsh got his cast off last winter and has been throwing with Pender since that day. Part of that return has been proving himself.
His first game back as the signal caller in the regular season was a 49-34 win over White County. He’s followed that with a 40-7 win over Dawson County, 28-6 win over Walnut Grove and 49-14 win over East Hall.
In those four games, he’s completed 66-of-90 attempts for 828 yards, 11 touchdowns, and one interception. He’s also rushed for 266 yards and five touchdowns.
Marsh’s 266 yards on the ground is second on the team and his five scores is tied for the team lead.
Still, that White County game is one Marsh won’t be forgetting any time soon.
“Oof. Yeah, that was fun. I was glad to be back,” Marsh said. “White County, we came out, everybody on our team was coming out hot. Everybody was fired up for it. You could just tell energy was in the air. [The Brickyard] was packed out. That was probably one of the funnest games I’ve played in my whole career.”
Marsh and the Trojans hope to keep rolling the senior season on a high when they travel to Oakwood to face Cherokee Bluff Friday at 7:30 p.m.
