The 2025 football season ended on top for Coosa Christian of Gadsden as they won the 2A state championship — the school’s first and Coach Rush Propst’s eighth state title. The Conquerors defeated Lanett 29-22 Friday at Birmingham’s Protective Stadium in the title game.

Though, the journey to the top started with challenges. Coosa Christian suspended their much-liked head coach, Mark O’Bryant, and hurriedly got a new interim, volunteer head coach in August as practice for the 2025 season was starting.

That new coach was Rush Propst, formerly the Athletic Director and Associate Head Coach for Coosa Christian for a brief stint. He left the school to become head coach at Pell City, but that lasted only one season.

So Coosa Christian needed a head coach quickly, and they called on a man they knew, Rush Propst.

Propst knows his way around Alabama high school football, and more importantly, knows how to win. His first coaching saga was as big as it gets — five state championships in the “big league” class at Hoover High School, 1999-2007.

His second period of success took place at Colquitt County and Valdosta, Georgia, leading the teams to Georgia state championships.

Then it was back to east Alabama as Athletic Director at Coosa Christian and then head coach at Pell City.

Rush Propst talks resignation from Pell City: ‘I was tired of fighting’ – Yellowhammer News

Following head coaching at Pell City, it was back to Coosa Christian where Propst suddenly became the volunteer, interim head coach.

Propst and the team lost their first two games. It would have been easy for coach and team to become discouraged after such an avalanche of adversity, but, they did just the opposite and rattled off a dozen straight wins on the way to the championship game.

Now that he is a state champion coach again, what does the future hold for Coach Rush Propst?

Will Coosa Christian remove the “interim” from his job title and come up with the funds to pay Propst a salary to continue as their head coach?

With apologies to “The Godfather,” will some other high school needing a coach with winning ways try to make Coach Propst an offer he can’t refuse?

Or will Coach Propst retire on top? That question is the easiest to answer. Propst shows no signs of quitting now.

The Coach Rush Propst story likely has many, many more chapters.

Jim Zig Zeigler is a contributing writer for Yellowhammer News. His beat includes the positive and colorful about Alabama – her people, events, groups and prominent deaths. He is a former State Auditor and Public Service Commissioner. You can reach him at [email protected]