AUBURN – Ramsay High School head football coach Rueben Nelson wasn’t even born the last time a Birmingham City School won an AHSAA state football championship.
Banks High defeated Grissom 21-0 at Legion Field Nov. 30, 1974, for the Class 4A, the state’s top class, for the title, it second straight championship.
No Birmingham City School had won a football title since. Ramsay gave up football in 1976 after a fifth straight losing season.
Nelson was born in 1976, the very year that football was discontinued at Ramsay, a school that had its first team in 1930, had its first unbeaten team in 1934, its last unbeaten team in 1941 and let the sport remain dormant for 36 years.
In 2012, Nelson was asked to resurrect the sport at the school on Birmingham’s Southside.
Friday night at Jordan-Hare Stadium, Nelson coached the Rams to the Super 7 Class 6A state football championship.
The Rams (13-2), with senior quarterback Baniko Harley leading the team, took control of the 2016 Super 7 championship game finale in the first half and then held on at the end to beat Opelika 21-16.
Harley rushed for 158 yards on 21 carries and was 8-of-18 passing for 132 yards and two scores.
Opelika (13-2), coached by Brian Blackmon, struck first when Weldrin Ford scored on a 1-yard run at 7:46 of the first quarter to cap a nine-play, 45-yard Bulldogs drive to take a 7-0 lead.
On the next series, Harley ignited the Rams with a dazzling cross-the-field 69-yard run that set up the Rams’ first score – his 9-yard pass to Genori Parrish. The extra point was blocked and Ramsay trailed 7-6 at 5:53 of the quarter. Harley and Parrish hooked up in the second quarter at 5:22 with the 8-yard connection for the TD closing out a 12-play, 85-yard march.
Ramsay got one more chance before the half and Joshua Horn kicked a 25-yard field goal to give Rams a 15-7 lead. The Rams defense recovered an Opelika fumble on the opening series of the third quarter and Harley turned it into six points with a 6-yard touchdown pass to Kordell Jackson just 2½ minutes into the second half to take a 21-7 lead.
Opelika, playing without starting quarterback J.D. Worth due to a first-half shoulder injury, marched 89 yards on 10 plays with sophomore quarterback Cade Blackmon at the throttles to cut the lead to 21-14 with 11:42 to play. Talik Jackson got the TD on a dazzling 40-yard run.
The Bulldogs got another break with 5:13 left when the ball was snapped over the Ramsay punter’s head out of the end zone for a safety to cut the lead to 21-16. That good fortune turned around quickly, however, when Opelika fumbled the ball on the free kick return at the Ramsay 30-yard line and Deshaun Oliver recovered for the Rams.
The Rams gambled on a fourth-and-27 from their 14 when Harley faked a punt and passed 29 yards to Oliver for a first down.
The last five minutes turned out to be tense as both teams battled to the end. Opelika, facing a fourth-and-1 at its own 40-yard line with just over a minute to play, came up short when Joshua Adams stopped Ford shy of the first-down mark. The Rams then ran out the clock.
Ramsay finished with 403 total yards on 76 plays and Opelika had 254 on 57 plays. Harley accounted for 290 yards with his passing and running. Teammate Thomas Hrabowski added 70 yards rushing on nine carries. Parrish finished with three catches for 30 yards.
Kordell Jackson led Ramsay defensively with six stops.
Ramsay began its title match win a 38-28 first-round win over Clay-Chalkville. The Rams beat Decatur 34-6, Minor 40-20 and Austin 25-14 in the semifinals.
Their two losses came at Grayson, Ga., 38-6, and at Class 7A Mountain Brook 19-13 in the regular-season finale.
This is the first state football crown in Ramsay history and just the third in Birmingham City Schools history since the playoffs began in 1966. Banks won back-to-back titles in 1972 and 1973.
Ramsay did have three “mythical” titles before the playoff system began, in 1934, 1946 and 1953.
It was something of a banner year for BCS football squads. Wenonah made it to the 5A final, losing to Beauregard 33-13 in the Dragons’ first appearance in the finals and posting the school’s winningest season in its 70-season history