This May, Soldiers To Sidelines proudly recognizes Major (Ret.) Nathaniel P. Redman, USMC, as our Soldier Coach of the Month. Now an assistant coach for cross-country and girls’ soccer with Mecklenburg County Public Schools in Virginia, Coach Redman has transformed his post-military journey into a mission of mentorship, leadership, and community impact. His coaching story began humbly—volunteering during the pandemic—and has grown into a passionate second calling. Drawing from his decorated Marine Corps career, Coach Redman channels his deep sense of purpose, discipline, and strategic thinking into developing young athletes on and off the field. His unwavering commitment to service continues to inspire through every sprint, strategy session, and sideline celebration. Learn more about Coach Redman’s journey and impact in coaching by reading the following interview.
STS: Tell your story about how and why you got into coaching. Discuss how coaching has impacted you as a person.
Coach Reman: After retiring from the USMC, I was pursuing a second career in education with hopes to give back to the community and to help shape the future through the next generation. My coaching journey began during the COVID era, and as we know, many sports had been canceled at the time. It was spring of 2021 when the small independent school I was part-time teaching at restarted their sports programs and had the idea to have a spring football season. An announcement was made asking for volunteers to help coach these sports, and that afternoon, I began my coaching journey by helping to coach JJV and varsity football. After two years with this independent school, I found myself teaching at a small Christian school in 2022, and through a series of events, I wound up helping their cross-country team. My daughter, Helen, joined the cross-country team, and I would stay after school to wait for her practice to come to an end. While waiting, I built my academic lesson plans and then would go work out in the school’s small gym. One day I brought my running gear and decided to run around the campus. While doing so, I bumped into some of the cross-country team not really running but walking and talking. I decided to speak with them and attempted to motivate and inspire them by asking them to join me. The cross-country coaches, who were beyond running age, saw this, and the next thing I know, I am out there as the cross-country coach who runs the course, inspiring, motivating, and keeping the cross-country athletes honest. That spring, the school was short an assistant soccer coach, and while I have never played soccer on an actual organized team, I felt that I knew enough about basic coaching and could fit the role of assistant coach. Plus, my daughter, Helen, also decided to play soccer, so I would again be around the school from 3-5pm waiting on her. I quickly fell in love with all things soccer, but unfortunately, the school was small and was not a good fit for my daughter’s ambitions, and we decided to look for greater educational, sports, and club offerings elsewhere. In 2023, we decided to enroll Helen in the local public school, which was now a combined (merged) school of two local public high schools. It was a newly built complex with all new sports facilities and a lot of educational & club opportunities. I decided to take a break from full-time teaching and needed to focus on my personal small business (residential rental homes), but at this point, I had a love for coaching, so I looked at the public school’s employment offerings, and assistant cross-country coach was available. I applied, interviewed, and was hired. That spring, there were no openings for girls’ soccer, but a lot of my cross-country athletes played soccer and wanted me to help out, so I became a volunteer coach for JV and varsity girls’ soccer. That year, the girls’ cross-country team won the District Championship, and the girls’ varsity soccer team came in third in the District Championship. After the 2023/2024 girls’ soccer season, all hired assistant coaches decided to not return. As a result, an actual hired/paying assistant soccer coach position opened up, and I applied, interviewed, and was hired. This season (2024/2025), we are currently ranked #2 in our district and have a chance to win the district championship.
When you join the military, you gain an identity, so to say, have a purpose, and feel like you are making a difference. When you retire from the military, you realize that all of that disappears instantly, and you have to, in a way, start over again, which is not easy to do. Getting into education and coaching has helped me regain an identity; it gives me a purpose, and you can once again make a difference, but this time in the local community and in young lives. Teaching and coaching, coaching in particular, has given me a new mission in life, and that is to give back to the local community who once gave to me. Coaching gives me the special something to look forward to each day; whether it is the mentoring, teaching, training, preparing for, identifying strategies, creating tactics, solving team problems, or overcoming team challenges, it is a combination of these reasons that I now have a new mission in life to look forward to each day, not to mention the athletes are fantastic young men and women to lead!
STS: How has your military experience influenced you as a coach?
Coach Reman: There are many parallels between my military and coaching experiences. While the military helped to hone my skills and abilities as a leader through many trials & tribulations as well as purposeful training with a specific outcome, as a coach, I use this same type of template to develop and train my athletes. Everything I do as a coach, both on and off the field, has a specific outcome for my athletes and the sports program. In particular, and very much like the military, I like to teach the sport to all athletes, making them smarter about all things cross-country and soccer. I like to impart and distill into them certain leadership traits like discipline, judgment, decision-making, and integrity. I like to build team captains who feel empowered to make on-field decisions as well as take care of smaller team issues. Finally, and very much like military battle planning, I like to review film with the captains/players in order to discuss and develop strategies & tactics that can be executed by the team to give us the edge to be the most competitive with the goal of winning.
STS: How has Soldiers To Sidelines impacted your life?
Coach Reman: Soldiers To Sidelines came into my life when I most needed it. Not only have I found a significant source of sports knowledge and professional development but also a network of coaches/mentors who I can reach out to as needed for various reasons. In particular, I thoroughly enjoy the different coffee chats and topics/discussions that come from these. I am always telling my fellow coaches about these coffee chats and what we discuss, which generally leads into us discussing these topics too. Soldiers To Sidelines and The Everyday Coach book have positively impacted how I coach, lead, and mentor my athletes, as well as how I engage with my fellow coaches. I wish I had had something like Soldiers To Sidelines during my young officer days in the military, as it would have helped me be a better military leader/instructor. Soldiers to Sidelines has become a big part of my everyday life!
STS: Describe a coaching interaction with a player, or group of players, that has a special place in your heart.
Coach Reman: A few interactions that I have had that stand out as special moments are recruiting my wife, Michelle, to help coach cross-country and now soccer. She also retired from the USMC but works for the school system I coach at. Coaching with her has given us a common bond/interests that we lost when we retired from the USMC. She helps to ground me at times most needed and supports the craziness that coaching often brings along with it. Speaking of cross-country craziness, we had a scavenger hunt competition one day amongst the team, and I teamed up with my wife; of course, as two former Marines, our pride isn’t going to allow us to lose to a bunch of non-Generation X kids. Needless to say, miles later with many, many scratches, scrapes, and bruises from taking shortcuts through things only Marines would dare try crossing, we crushed our athletes and won that race! Another is our first soccer win in the 2023/2024 season. I promised the girls that if they won, I would do a cartwheel on the field; needless to say, they won, I did the cartwheel, and of course I felt that for days afterwards, but the players loved it, and it helped build a bond with them. A final standout interaction occurred while I was walking out to the field one day before a game to see the soccer team lying in a circle in the middle of our turf field, just being kids. I was supposed to go over the game formation and a few plays with them, but I could see this was a moment, so I decided to run up to them and dove into their circle and just acted like a kid with them for a time. Of course, I did review the formations and plays with them while in the circle, and needless to say, they won that game, and it became another bonding moment, but unbeknownst to me at that time, a few pictures now exist thanks to a fellow coach.
STS: What are your aspirations in coaching?
Coach Reman: Presently my coaching goals are to stay at the high school level and continue to develop and grow the cross-country and soccer programs. I believe at the moment my calling is to help stabilize these programs by being a “constant.” I have learned that high school athletes are very much like adults; they want change, but they don’t do well when it actually happens. Being a “constant” as a coach will help bring a certain stability these athletes seem to need at this time in their lives.
STS: What was the most difficult challenge you have experienced in coaching, and what have you learned from that experience?
Coach Reman: As I entered into teaching and coaching, neither profession was easy, but I have learned that you have to find the right school/team in order to make it work. My first real teaching/coaching experience didn’t go well, and I found myself in an environment that went against all of my morals, values, and ethics. While I tried to stay, make it work, and do my best to make positive impacts, too much was against me, and a culture was already in place that I didn’t want to be a part of, nor could I seem to change it. As a result, I resigned from the job and walked away before I lost who I was and wanted to be. It was the hardest thing I have ever had to do, but through this trial & tribulation and with time & patience, I used this “miss” and learned that sometimes you can’t go home, and it is better to go where no one knows your name. What I learned from this experience is that you have to be willing to move, establish new roots, and make new friends—that is a key to career success.
STS: Is there anything else you can share with us about your coaching story?
Coach Reman: At the moment, coaching has become a big part of my life; it has become a new identity for me, and I feel like I am making a difference in tomorrow through today’s youth. Just like in the military and in life, there are good and bad days in coaching, but those good days and moments are the reason we make the sacrifice. The pay comes in smiles, cheers, goals accomplished, and thank-yous from the players and their parents. I would like to take a moment as I close to thank Harrison Bernstein and Soldiers To Sidelines for doing what they do and reminding us every day of why we make this sacrifice—thank you for all you do for us; your own sacrifice was worth it!
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