Navy linebacker MarcAnthony Parker didn’t sound like a player coming off the best game of his football career.
Parker posted 11 tackles, then a career high, in a 42-23 win at Tulsa on Sept. 13. When asked about his performance, the sophomore quickly downplayed it.
“I didn’t even feel like I played really well, to be honest,” Parker said on Glenn Clark Radio Sept. 18. “… There’s so much more to improve on. Proving it to the coaches, it’s just building trust like, ‘Yes, I can do this.’ Also in the linebacker room showing them this is what you need to do, just learning from people.”
That approach comes from Navy’s “1-0 mentality” and from Parker’s Christian-based faith. It paid off the following week, when the 6-foot, 218-pound linebacker posted 13 tackles in a 21-13 win against Rice.
Parker’s big game against Tulsa was the kind of moment he had been waiting for after spending much of his freshman season buried on the depth chart.
“You come from high school thinking you’re going to play right away. I think that’s almost everybody’s mentality,” Parker said. “Then you come in first day and you see yourself buried on the depth chart. You’re like, ‘Dang, OK, I’ve got work to do.’ Just locking in on the playbook and trusting in God’s plan.”
Parker draws inspiration from former Navy linebacker Colin Ramos, who played in 45 career games, racked up 327 tackles and was co-captain of the team last year.
“Colin was a great mentor. He’s still around coaching for us, so it’s still good to learn from him, too, but he was a good mentor,” Parker said. “I would take stuff from him, and I would strive to learn stuff from him, so I don’t make those mistakes. If he made a mistake, I wouldn’t want to make that mistake.”
The Midshipmen want to make a run at the 12-team College Football Playoff and take home the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy. The trophy has been awarded since 1972 and is given annually to the service academy that has the best record of a round-robin series between Army, Air Force and Navy. The Mids have won 17 times, including last year.
“Our big goal is to make the College Football Playoff. That’s the big goal I feel like we have. We’re very capable … college football playoffs, winning the conference, obviously the CIC,” Parker said.
Football runs in Parker’s family. His older brother, Anthony, played soccer at Navy, though at first that wasn’t enough to convince Parker to follow the same path.
“If you told me … leading into my junior football season I was going to Navy, I would’ve probably laughed at you,” said Parker, who explained that seeing his brother develop as a person encouraged him to look into Navy.
“Seeing him graduate from the Naval Academy and what kind of person he is, it was obviously the military, but it was mostly just the person he is,” Parker said. “He’s more mature. He’s stable. The money, that’s all there. He became mature. He’s a good person. Obviously, he does things the right way.”
Now Parker is carving out his own path, and he says being close to home in Fredericksburg, Va., is another blessing.
“It does help a lot,” he said. “Some of my teammates will come home with me. We’ll chill, watch college football games or NFL football games.”
For more from Parker, listen to the full interview here:
Photo Credit: Courtesy of Navy Athletics