The story behind the viral 17 year-old true freshman at Alabama.
Ryan Williams is taking the internet by storm after his spectacular performance in an incredible Georgia-Alabama game this past Saturday. In one the biggest games of the year he had 6 receptions for 177 yards while running late in the fourth quarter for a jaw-dropping 75-yard touchdown at just 17 years of age.
At just 17 years old, Ryan Williams decided to reclass and skip his final year of high school and head off to Alabama early, where he is starting and dominating as a true freshman. While still in high school, he was putting up video game-like numbers with 1078 rushing yards, averaging 11.5 yards per carry; at receiver, he had 3254 receiving yards, with 187 catches, averaging 17.4 yards with 47 touchdowns. Furthermore, his 22-23 season was unfathomable, with 2387 total yards and 39 touchdowns. Overall, he was unstoppable and unguardable in high school football, scoring 71 touchdowns and 4440 total yards. He was the first two-time winner of Alabama’s Mr. Football Award. With such dominance in high school football in Alabama, one of the most competitive states, he looked for a more challenging environment by reclassing and skipping his senior season and heading to Alabama at just 17 years old.
At Alabama, he has made his mark by winning the starting spot and then dominating his true freshman season with 544 yards and six touchdowns in the first five games of the season. He ranked first in all of college football with an average of 28.9 yards per catch and second in the SEC for yards per game, total yards, and touchdowns. Additionally, after his monster game against Georgia, he is in contention for the Heisman trophy, and his NIL evaluation nearly doubled to 1.5 million, now one of the highest in college sports. Ryan Williams is just one part of the stacked Bama offense, with their QB being Jalen Milroe, the clear front-runner for the Heisman this year, and a hoard of other extremely talented wide receivers like Germie Brenard and Kobe Prentice, in combination with these players to make Alabama a top 20 offense.
Despite coming off a spectacular win against No. 2 Georgia, the AP number one team in the country, and not having lost to Vanderbilt since Ronald Reagan was president, Vanderbilt pulled off the impossible and beat Alabama for the first time in more than four decades, the first time to beat the number one team in country in the programs history. Despite this shocking loss, Ryan Williams still balled out with three catches for 82 yards and a touchdown. While not his most breathtaking performance against Georgia, he still played exceptionally well and helped out the team vastly even though Alabama fell short of the win.
Ryan Williams is undeniably the future of college football for the next three years before the NFL. He is just 17 years old and is dominating one of the most competitive conferences in college football; he is the face of college football and will most likely win the Heisman trophy down the line. Furthermore, if he chooses to get drafted in his junior year, he undoubtedly will be a first-round pick and one of the youngest players ever to be drafted at only 20 years old. While it is still too early to tell if Ryan Williams is going to be one of the greats, it seems very likely that we have found the next great generational receiver that will take the SEC, NFL, and potentially the Hall of Fame by storm in the years to come.
Timmy Hale
Indresh Chandel