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HIGH SCHOOL
Des Moines Register
Axel Ramazani is a silent presence at Urbandale football practice.
Not aloof but rather reserved, he avoids the typical tomfoolery – fake sparring, fighting over footballs during non-competitive catch sessions, the usual high school hearsay – that occurs before the start of drills.
He places his shoulder pads, jersey hanging loosely over top, in the end zone and wanders languidly around the field. He pauses to say a few words to some teammates, before making his way to a bench stationed by a few orange water coolers.
Ramazani sits – still quiet – and watches the junior varsity players go through the beginning of practice. Urbandale’s coaching staff trickles in one by one, and Ramazani makes his way back to the endzone, pulls the pads over his head and waits.
A whistle blows. Players gather around. Ramazani positions himself close to the middle of the circle. He is a quiet presence, but a presence, nonetheless.
Ramazani doesn’t need to say much, not on the football field.
Because in practice and on Friday nights, the Urbandale senior lets his play do the talking and, boy, does it say a lot.
The 6-foot-3, 220-pound defensive lineman led all Class 5A players with eight sacks last season – a number that put him in the top 40 in the state in that statistical category. He finished his junior year with 57 total tackles, a large jump from the 7.5 total tackles and one sack he recorded as a sophomore.
Now in the middle of his senior year, Ramazani is up to 33.5 total tackles, 1.5 sacks and a fumble recovery, and he didn’t play a single snap in Urbandale’s game against Des Moines East.
Ramazani’s statistics from this season don’t tell the full story, though. Opponents know he is the player to look out for, and that often results in extra coverage.
But it’s never been about padding the stat sheet, not for Ramazani.
It’s about representing Urbandale – where he was born and raised – the right way.
“His actions speak for themselves,” head coach Sam Anderson, who’s known Ramazani since third grade, told the Register. “You know, he’s getting double-teamed every game, sometimes triple-teamed.
“But he’s not getting frustrated, and he’s letting other people make the plays. He understands that sometimes the great players aren’t the ones with the best stat line.”
Ramazani might not pay attention to how many tackles he recorded or how many times he took a quarterback down. But college coaches do pay attention to that information, and quite a few showed interest in what Ramazani brought to the field.
He is listed as a three-star recruit – the No. 15 prospect among players in Iowa – by 247Sports. He picked up eight Division I offers between February and May, including Cincinnati, Northern Iowa and Wyoming.
Ramazani eventually chose the Cowboys.
“It just felt right, the people,” he said of his decision. “It was the most important thing, being able to trust the people.”
But North Dakota State offered Ramazani first, and his response was anything but ordinary.
Anderson and Ramazani were together when the Urbandale star got that call. A coach on the other end of the line presented not only a chance to play Division I football, but to also get a college education for free.
He hung up the phone and asked his coach a simple question: “Why me?”
Ramazani – coming off a junior season in which he led Iowa’s large-school class in sacks – couldn't understand why he earned that offer over others. He felt similarly as schools continued to contact him.
“I know there’s a lot of people that work hard for it,” Ramazani said, bluntly. “At that point, I didn’t feel like I worked hard enough for it. I felt like there were more steps I had to take.”
There is a humility in the way Ramazani goes about his business, a lack of an ego that is sometimes a side effect of being among the top football players in any given state.
He’s the type of player who checks in on opponents after a hard hit; not an exaggeration, that can be seen on his highlight reel. He takes pride in being an Urbandale kid, and he’s someone Anderson knows will do great things beyond the Des Moines metro.
Ramazani just focuses on himself and does the work.
He’ll go far – in football and in the world – if he continues what he started at Urbandale.
Alyssa Hertel is the college sports recruiting reporter for the Des Moines Register. Contact Alyssa at [email protected] or on Twitter @AlyssaHertel.