Alabama Mr. Football Ryan Williams Leads Class of 2025
When Saraland head football coach Jeff Kelly looks around at the group of returners from last year’s Alabama Class 6A state championship team, he can’t help but smile. You would too if your team included the reigning Alabama Mr. Football and Gatorade Player of the Year.
However, Kelly says as grateful as he is for Ryan Williams –who became the first-ever sophomore in Alabama high school football history to win the Mr. Football honor – he wants folks to know Williams will have a pretty good group of teammates returning with him.
“We are more than a one-man show,” Kelly says.
But don’t think for one minute that Kelly isn’t aware that it was Williams’ breakout season last year that was the main reason for the Spartans being able to win their first state championship.
Kelly had led Saraland to two previous state title games but came up short each time. With Williams and his 4 TDs and 272 yards of total offense paving the way in Saraland’s 28-17 romp over Mountain Brook, there would be no denying the Spartans the championship in 2022.
Kelly wasn’t surprised. He’s known for a while that the Alabama commit was going to be a special player. And that was well before the start of last season, and well before Williams was starting to appear on everyone’s talent radar.
Williams ‘Had Been a Quarterback His Whole Life’
Kelly recalls the first time he saw Williams play.
“My son is in that same class as Ryan, so I’ve been following him for a while,” Kelly says. “Ryan had been a quarterback his whole life.”
That was where he played in middle school, but during the spring before his freshman season, Kelly says a situation at a Saraland practice changed everything.
“We were short a receiver,” Kelly recalls, “and Ryan jumped in there and ran a few routes and caught some passes.”
Kelly remembers thinking how natural Williams looked at receiver, despite having not played the position. The Saraland coach says he decided the next day to try Williams at receiver, and he knew then that the quarterback was about to become a wide receiver – for good.
“He was just a natural at it, the way he ran routes – he picked it up pretty quickly,” Kelly says.
Williams would play receiver as a freshman, and while he had decent numbers, there still wasn’t anything that would indicate he was a year away from becoming an Alabama Mr. Football. Not to most people at least.
But Jeff Kelly knew.
“Going into the spring of his 10th-grade year, his body began to change, he began to really mature, and his confidence began to grow,” Kelly says.
Kelly remembers Williams had a “tremendous spring,” and he began to tell people about this little-known former QB who had just completed his first full season as a receiver for Saraland.
“I remember telling everyone just before the season started that Williams was going to be one of the best receivers to ever come out of the state of Alabama,” Kelly recalls.
And the response?
“People thought I had lost my mind,” the Saraland coach remembers. “Here was this receiver who had caught maybe 30 passes the year before [it was actually 36] as a ninth-grader, and people thought I was crazy.”
Kelly says it was around the halfway point of last season when observers began to believe Kelly.
“I just knew he was going to be a special player, and I probably talked about him more than I do about most other players,” he says.
Williams enjoyed a breakout season last year, finishing with 88 catches for 1,641 yards and 24 receiving touchdowns. He rushed for 700 yards and 15 more TD’s. Williams also had two punt returns for TDs, and he even threw a TD pass.
“We try to get him as involved as we can,” Kelly says.
Off the field, Kelly says Ryan Williams carries himself well: “He does the right things around school, and he comes from a great family.”
Ryan Williams is a special young man – no doubt.
More Than a One-Man Show
As great as Ryan Williams is, the Saraland head coach is quick to point out the supporting cast that surrounds him. That includes several other rising juniors.
Quarterback KJ Lacey will be back for his junior season. He threw for over 3,100 yards last year, with 40 TD passes.
“He’s one of the best QBs in the state,” Kelly says of Lacey.
Other members of the 2025 class who will return include the team’s leading rusher, Santae McWilliams. He rushed for 1,484 yards with 16 TDs last season. In the state championship win, McWilliams had 27 carries for 158 yards for Saraland. Kelly calls McWilliams “the total back.”
The team’s leading receiver from a year ago is also a returning junior. CD Gill finished the season with 683 yards receiving and 7 TDs. Another rising junior, Antonio Coleman, is a 6-foot, 2-inch, 265-pound defensive lineman who is one of the most sought-after players in the state, with multiple offers including Alabama, Tennessee, Marshall, and Memphis.
Kelly sounds like he knows classes like this don’t come around too often.
“The good Lord blessed our 2025 class with a lot of talent,” he acknowledges.
