The dynasty continues! Thomas Heyward rolls to fourth-straight state championship
Thomas Heyward Academy extended its dominance in SCISA Class A football on Saturday. And with young players like Tony O’Banner, that supremacy doesn’t appear to be slowing down any time soon.
The eighth-grader ran for a pair of touchdowns as the Rebels captured their fourth-straight state championship with a 35-13 win over Lee Academy in a game played at Charleston Southern University.
“I thought before the season I was going to be one of those super rookies and sitting the bench,” O’Banner said. “But it turns out I ended up starting. At first I didn’t know I would be able to do it, but I did it.
“Being with the seniors is special and they have helped me. I look up to guys like Brandon Howard and I hope we can win another one.”
O’Banner finished the game with a season-high 179 yards on 12 carries and went over 1,000 yards for the year. He entered Saturday with 848 yards and four 100-yard games.
“If you look at him, he is a specimen,” Thomas Heyward coach Nic Shuford said. “He is an eighth-grader but he is 6-foot-1 and 185 pounds and probably runs a 4.7 in the 40-yard dash. But beyond that, he is coachable and that is all you can ask for.”
Thomas Heyward (12-1) finished the season on a 10-game winning streak with its lone loss coming against public school Bluffton 29-22 in overtime on Sept. 10. The Rebels’ average margin of victory was 38.7 points per game.
“We came really close to winning it in 2012 and since then the mindset has kind of flipped,” Shuford said. “We have had some rough years but the mentality and the work ethic hasn’t changed. These guys are reaping the benefits of it.”
It was the second-straight year the two teams played in the Class A finals. Thomas Heyward won last season 46-14.
The Rebels scored on their first three possessions of the game and then made it 28-7 with 4:14 in the second quarter when Jordan Mikell returned a fumble for a touchdown. THA’s defense forced three turnovers in the game.
Anthony Fripp also had a TD run and quarterback Tyshon Mansell had a touchdown pass to Brandon Howard.
This story was originally published November 20, 2021 at 2:58 PM.
