AISA FINALS: Banks earns first-ever state title; Lee-Scott, Glenwood take Class AAA
Banks Academy players jump for joy after winning the AISA Class A state championship over Escambia Academy. (Tim Gayle)
COMBINED REPORTS
For Banks Academy, it was more than just a game.
The east Birmingham private school, now in its fourth year as an AISA program, made the most of its first-ever trip to the final four by defeating Escambia Academy 58-51 in the AISA Class A finals to win the school’s first championship at the Multiplex at Cramton Bowl on Friday.
“The public schools, they say, is more competition,” said Banks Academy senior Isaac Smith Jr. “Everybody is down on us, saying we don’t play anybody. But everybody has talent and you can’t doubt nobody. Don’t judge a book by its cover. We don’t listen to it, we just focus on us and play our game.”
The idea behind Banks Academy was announced in the summer of 2015 when a group of Banks High School alumni came up with the idea of reviving the well-known high school in East Lake with a new private school on the site of the old school.
Banks High opened in 1957 and was one of the state’s most acclaimed high school athletic programs in the 1970s, particularly its football program under George “Shorty” White. White’s youngest son Darryl was one of the founding members of Banks Academy and its board president when the school started its athletics programs in 2018 and joined the Alabama Independent School Association for the 2020-21 school year.
It wasn’t able to use the site of the old Banks High School, which later became a middle school until its closing in 2006, and has since moved to a new location, but the concept of Banks Academy (which uses the original school’s nickname, the Jets) has continued from its inception, providing some type of scholarship money to 100 percent of its students who are from low-income families.
The program has slowly developed with each passing year. The Banks Academy girls’ basketball team earned the school’s first-ever playoff berth in the Elite Eight, losing 43-15 to Evangel. The next fall, in 2021, the Jets’ football team made its first postseason appearance. The following spring, Banks made the Elite Eight in boys’ basketball, drawing closer to a win in 2023 and finally reaching the finals in 2024.
“Everybody doubted us,” Smith said. “Nobody thought we were going to make it. We’ve come a long way. We put in the hard work every day. I know we played bad at times, but we pushed through it.”
Against a taller Escambia Academy team, the Jets managed to stay ahead but quickly ran into foul trouble.
“We’re a really aggressive team so I think we’re used to playing with fouls,” Banks Academy coach Cameron Davenport said. “Early in the season, we would have fouled out. Now, I say guys, we’ve got a couple of fouls, make sure we’re not reaching, make sure we’re taking less chances. They listened.”
Smith picked up his third personal foul two minutes into the second quarter. Davenport decided to leave his senior on the floor.
“It was a big risk,” Davenport said, “because he’s the one that’s most aggressive. He loves to get his steals and loves to take chances, so it was a big risk. He said he wouldn’t foul, so I had to go with my gut and say, ‘all right, he says he’s not going to foul,’ but I wanted to take him out. I knew if I took him out, his head might get out of there and I needed to keep his head in the game.”
Smith was one of four Jets that played most of the second half with four personal fouls in a battle against the taller Cougars, with three of the four finishing the game. Smith had 14 points for Banks (15-6), followed by Tavarus Robinson with 13 and Artrell Cox with 10.
“It was hard because I’m used to jumping and going up when somebody takes a shot,” Smith said, “but when I’ve got three fouls I can’t do that. They’re used to me being down there (in the post) so it changed (our strategy) a lot. That’s why they were getting most of their buckets in the paint because they saw I had foul fouls.”
Ronta Watson led Escambia (18-3) with 23 points, while Quinton Odom had 15, including 11 in the fourth quarter.
Seniors Jekari Harris, Cox, Camadre Coleman and Smith are among those players who took a chance at playing for the Birmingham private school when others in their neighborhood went to the city’s public schools. Now, they’re part of a group of athletes fighting to create a new tradition with an old familiar name.
“Mostly, we’re on the east side, but we’ve got a couple of kids from the west side as well,” Davenport said. “The name of Banks is going throughout Birmingham. Hopefully, we’ll be getting kids from all over who want to come and be a part of a Christian education and a good environment, a good athletics program, good teachers, good coaches. Hopefully, the name is getting around. We’re doing positive things up there.”
Class AAA girls
Glenwood School 45, Lee-Scott Academy 36
Glenwood coach Dusty Perdue knew exactly what to expect from Lee-Scott Academy in Friday’s Class AAA championship game at the Multiplex at Cramton Bowl. Then again, he didn’t.
The two region rivals were playing each other for the fifth time this season and for the fifth time Glenwood won. But there was nothing easy about Friday’s 45-36 win. In fact, Lee-Scott coach Corye Harrison switched to a zone defense that seemed to frustrate the Gators at times.
“Every time we’ve played them, it’s gotten closer and closer,” Perdue said. “Every time you play somebody, you get to know what they’re doing, what their tendencies are. Corye’s a great coach, I tip my hat to them. They played really, really hard, we were just the better team again tonight and we stepped up with our senior leadership.”
Senior forward T.K Davis provided eight of her 19 points in the fourth quarter for Glenwood (28-5), followed by Clara Crisco with 10. Clarke Ivatt led Lee-Scott (17-10) with 10 points.
Class AAA boys
Lee-Scott Academy 64, Bessemer Academy 57
Lee-Scott Academy maintained a five-point lead throughout much of the second half, but had to beat back a late run by Bessemer Academy to defeat the Rebels 64-57 in the AISA Class AAA finals at the Multiplex at Cramton Bowl on Friday night.
Bessemer (24-2) cut the lead to one point and had several chances to tie the game or take the lead, but each time Lee-Scott (27-5) found a way to keep the momentum.
“I thought we were resilient,” Lee-Scott coach William Johnson said. “We’ve been resilient all year. We have a young team -- eight sophomores and one freshman -- and there were several times we were (all) sophomores and freshmen. We’ve talked about overcoming adversity. Our point guard (Haiden Harper) is seven days removed from surgery and he had 28 points tonight. They just found a way tonight.”
Barrett Cook added 11 and Ben Aldridge had nine for the Warriors, who held Bessemer's 3-point specialist, Jordan Jeter, to a pair of 3-pointers and 12 points. Johnathan Winston led the Rebels with 20 points.