Play 12. That’s been the goal all year for the Newton Rams. You see, playing 12 games in high school football means that you’ve won a first round state playoff game, something Newton hasn’t done, ever. The Rams won two region playoff games in 1987, but region playoffs were eliminated in 1994 and Newton has never won a state playoff game. Until now.
Head coach Terrance Banks and the Rams traveled down to South Georgia and upset third-ranked Valdosta High Friday night. So the Rams, who had two games cancelled due to bad weather and have technically only played nine games so far, will “play 12” Friday at Sharp Stadium against Central Gwinnett. We talked with Banks about the win.
The Covington News: All season you’ve been telling me the goal is to “play 12.” Now that you’ve done that, talk a little bit about that accomplishment.
Terrance Banks: It’s the first time in school history that we’ve won – officially – a playoff game, state playoff game, the first time since 1987 that we’ve played more than 11 games. I’m trying to build a program. I’m trying to build a championship program at Newton. We along for the ride and each step of the way changes the future. That’s what we’ve accomplished right now, but the season isn’t over. Now we wanna play 13 (games). But that’s what that means to win last night.
CN: Coach, talk about the mindset that you instilled in your team going down to Valdosta. You beat the team that has the most playoff victories and you’re the team that, like you said, didn’t have any playoff victories. So talk about that a little bit.
Banks: That’s why – every year people always say, “Why do you play Lowndes? Why do you play Valdosta?” You could play teams and build your record. Too many coaches looking to be 9-1 going into the playoffs and they think if your team is 5-5 that you’re not a good football team. Iron sharpens iron. So the only way to be the best is to beat the best. We go down there in the regular season to sharpen iron and to get better for the playoffs. Once you get to the second season everybody is 0-0. To go down to Valdosta where high school football is king and beat Valdosta in Valdosta at Death Valley is a huge accomplishment for us.
CN: Last question. Give me three keys to victory that enabled you guys to get that win.
Banks: Defense, man. No. 1, six interceptions. Everybody knows we’re an offensive team, but our defense played lights out. And I talked about it at the beginning of the year that we had to grow up. They did a lot of growing up. I’m a big believer in saving kids. We played a whole bunch of kids during the season to get them ready. We didn’t always play our best players both ways during the season. But in the playoffs you had a lot of kids that did play both ways. We had kids step up. So defense is No. 1. I can’t say enough about the leadership of our quarterback. When he’s healthy you can tell that we’re a different program. The third is just belief. The way we won the Rockdale game I think propelled us to our kids believing that no matter what happens we’re going to be able to fight through it. That’s what we did down there (Friday night).
