WESTVIEW, Fla. – Growing up in Minneapolis, Corbin Lafrance learned how to take hits as well as dish them out at a young age playing hockey.
“I felt bad because I knocked out teeth and gave three kids concussions,” Lafrance said. “After a jamboree one year, I saw one kid going into an ambulance after a jamboree. I thought, I’m too rough for this game. I quit after the fourth grade.”
Lafrance didn’t play hockey anymore after the fourth grade, instead he took up football after he and his family moved to Georgia the following year.
It’s no wonder Lafrance, now a senior quarterback at Kell High in Marietta, Georgia, still doesn’t shy away from a big hit.
Lafrance, a Robert Morris signee, showed that same grit this past Sunday while playing for Team Georgia in the Florida-Georgia All-Star Game in Miami.
Lafrance entered the game early in the third quarter and facing a 3rd-and-8 deep in Georgia’s territory, took off down the middle for a key 28-yard rush diving between oncoming defenders for more yards.
“Coaches like quarterbacks sliding, but I only did that once and it didn’t go well,” Lafrance said. “I’d rather go for those extra yards.”
It wasn’t just Lafrance’s toughness that caught the attention of the Robert Morris coaching staff.
Lafrance threw for 1,739 yards during his senior season and earned All-Region honors once again leading Kell to a 6-4 record and back to the postseason.
After suffering a concussion himself which kept him out for two games, Lafrance returned and put up performances like his team’s 43-13 victory over South Cobb High in which he passed for four touchdowns and ran for another.
Lafrance joins a squad which went 7-5 in 2019 under coach Bernard Clark Jr. and is scheduled to play five games this spring starting with a game against Kennesaw State on April 3.
“They run a lot of spread and bring it in with tight ends so it’s very similar to what we ran at Kell,” Lafrance said. “I’m pretty comfortable with any offense we run and I’ve already started to go over the playbook a little bit so I can get there and immediately start training on specific things once I get to campus.”
The Colonials have six quarterbacks on their roster – none of whom are seniors – including four rising sophomores and redshirt junior George Martin, the team’s primary starter during the 2019 season.
Undersized for a quarterback at 6-feet, 192 pounds, Lafrance didn’t garner any FBS-level offers.
Lafrance grew up a fan of Drew Brees, who also stands at 6-feet tall, and said he once caught a wristband he tossed to him in the stands after a Saints game against the Vikings that he attended.
Robert Morris, however, took an interest in Lafrance, who signed with the Colonials in December. Lafrance, whose father played hockey and mother ran in track and field in high school, would become the first player in his family to play college football.
“I still remember that call and it was just instant gratification after all the hard work and devotion the past eight years that I put in and my family put in,” Lafrance said. “It meant so much that they gave me this opportunity.”
