Goins, Marable, Keith sign National Letters of Intent
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Joshuah Keith celebrated signing his National Letter of Intent to play football for U.T. Martin in West Tennessee. Pictured are (back row from left) Clinton head coach and father, Darell Keith; brother, Donovan; D’Mon Marable; (front row) Joshuah Keith and mother Janette. - Tony Cox
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D’Mon Marable signed his National Letter of Intent to play football for Purdue in West Lafayette, Indiana. Pictured are (back row from left) India Rogers, Tina Watkins, Derren Marable, Monique Rogers and Ta’Shae Rogers. (Front row) Brandon Rogers Jr., D’Mon Marable and Da’mondre Marable. - Tony Cox
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Jawan Goins signed his National Letter of Intent to play football for the University of Richmond, Virginia . Pictured are (second row from left) Kriscilla Santos, (sister) Niessa Echols, (mother) Latausha Goins, Tiffany Cook and (father) Marvin Goins. - Tony Cox
Three Clinton High School football players officially finalized their college plans when they each signed their National Letters of Intent at CHS on Wednesday, Dec. 20.
Running back Jawan Goins, safety D’Mon Marable and quarterback Joshuah Keith each signed and will be off to college in January as all will be early college enrollees.
Jawan Goins signs with Richmond
Goins will play at Richmond. Marable will head to the Big Ten where he’ll play for Purdue and Keith will go west to continue his football career and academic pursuits at UT-Martin.
During the 2023 season, all three players were significant contributors as the Dragons won five of their last six games and upset longtime rival Oak Ridge on the road in the TSSAA Class 5A playoffs.
Clinton went 6-7 in the recently completed campaign and reached the state quarterfinals for the first time since the early 1990s.
Goins will play for the Spiders after considering opportunities at Miami (Ohio) and Chattanooga.
He’ll be seven hours away from home and said that he wanted to stay relatively close to East Tennessee.
“I wanted to stay closer to home due to my family situation,” Goins said. “I’ll be up there and I’ll be about seven hours away.”
He hasn’t made any career plans but said that he plans to study philosophy at Richmond.
Goins noted that the environment at the school and in the community played a major role in his decision to attend Richmond and play for the Spiders.
“It was mainly the environment,” he said. “It felt like home and the people were really friendly and really welcoming.”
Goins also noted that small class size at the school appealed to him.
“I think I’ll have 16 to 20 people in most of my classes, maybe less,” he said. “Getting to know my professors is going to be important and I feel like I’ll do a lot better in that environment.”
D’Mon to play at Purdue
Marable, on the other hand, will play on the national stage at a Power 5 school and he said that he’s looking forward to playing for the Boilermakers.
“I can’t wait to get up there and start working on football,” he said. “They have a great fan base.
“I can’t wait to get up there and get better. The time is now.”
He’ll be far from home. But he said that that didn’t matter.
“I just wanted to be where I could fit in,” Marable said. “Up there, they’re good people and it felt like a family and I’m looking forward to getting up there in January.”
Marable will head to West Lafayette as an undeclared major.
Joshuah Keith signs with UT Martin
Keith, Clinton’s starting quarterback for parts of the last four seasons, will be closer to home as he will play for the Skyhawks in West Tennessee. He also considered Tennessee State, Marshall and Eastern Kentucky.
His decision to attend UT-Martin was about more than just football.
“I’m a student-athlete, so I’m a student first,” Keith said. “I’m blessed to have this opportunity and I thought this was the best place for me.
“It didn’t necessarily matter if I was close to home, I just wanted to go where I could learn to be an independent guy.”
Keith, the son of Dragons’ head coach Darell Keith, said he’ll major in engineering and that Martin has a premiere program emphasizing the field.
Football is big for both father and son and Joshuah said that it’s important for his family to get the chance to see him play the game in college, whether it be at the stadium or on television.
“It’s very important to me for my family to get to see me play,” Joshuah said. “It’s important, whether they see me in person or on TV.
“My dad has always been there with me and football and old Western shows are all we watch together, and when I was younger, my mom had cancer and she didn’t get the chance to see me play.”