GENTRY — Editor's Note: This is the third in a series of stories previewing the high school football teams in Benton County.
Score it 1-1 for the fiercely competitive Ramsey senior football players of BentonCounty.
Tyler Ramsey leads the Pea Ridge Blackhawk at tailback and as a three-year starter on defense. Caleb Ramsey is the record-setting, three-year stud quarterback for the Gentry Pioneers.
They're cousins.
Gentry beat Pea Ridge 14-8 in a 1-4A Conference game whenthe two were juniors. As sophomores, Pea Ridge prevailed 29-6.
Let the trash talking for lifelong bragging rights commence.
"We get along," Tyler says with a smile after practice last week about his relatives, Caleb and Caleb's brother, Pioneers' junior linebacker and running back Eathan. "We see each other at family gatherings and stuff about every other month or so.
"Yeah, we talk some football.
They think they will be pretty good. They have a bunch of seniors this year. I trash talk them sometimes; I tell them, wait til you play us."
And therein starts the roughhousing.
"We beat them my sophomore year over there," Tyler says. "I told them about it, then they beat us last year (at Gentry, too) and there wasn't much I could say."
They settle the rubber match Oct. 9.
Tyler Ramsey (6-foot-1, 185 pounds) factors huge into the Pea Ridge Blackhawks' resurgence under head coach Tony Travis. Not only is Ramsey a bruising tailback and defensive back, he's a part-time quarterback.
Ramsey is the sort of player, Travis says, you could build a Wildcat offense around.
"Ramsey is a three-year start-er at strong safety on defense," the new head coach says. "He gives us a lot of experience in the secondary. He's contributed a lot the past couple of years on offense. We'll lean on him a lot."
Travis says Ramsey is a powerful running back who has some speed and athleticism.
"Ramsey will also play some quarterback in some situations," the coach says.
"We may eventually work into some Wildcat offensive situations where we do some of that. I know that's the rage for everybody.
We've got to have something. If we don't we will be left out."
Ramsey directs the secondary and he likes what he sees of his new coach.
"I like the offense we're running," he says. "A lot of it is the same stuff we've been doing with some nice differences. I'm throwing the football more than before."
He says Pea Ridge football, a one-time Class 3A contender that fell on hard times in its maiden Class 4A season, is pointed in the right direction.
"It's headed up with this new coach," he says. "I like him a lot. Practices are intense; we get after it a lot more. I think we're getting a lot accomplished."
Ramsey has played football in Pea Ridge since the sixth grade. The 1-9 campaign they suffered through was his worst.
"It was pretty frustrating," he says, disdain dripping in his voice. "We worked hard and didn't seem like we got anything accomplished, just that one win, over Huntsville."
Ramsey scored from the 1-yard line late in a game to lift the Blackhawks to their lone victory of the season - a 26-21 win over Huntsville.
He says there should be more Blackhawk wins in 2009.
That includes one - and you can tack it right now on the bulletin board and pass it around at the next family picnic - on Oct. 9.
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Thursday: Siloam Springs
Sports, Pages 7, 8 on 08/26/2009