TIFTON — Rosendo Ramirez is going to be making a slight change. After this school year, he will not be a Blue Devil, he will be a Blue Raider. The Tift County kicker committed to Middle Tennessee State Thursday in a ceremony held at the TCHS media center.

“Rosendo was a great player for us,” said Tift football head Ashley Anders.

Ramirez, who played both football and soccer, did most of his football scoring as a senior as his brother, Fernando, was the Blue Devils starter for the majority of his high school days.

After Anders spoke, Ramirez thanked everyone for attending his ceremony.

“It’s been a long journey,” he said. “I appreciate everybody for sticking with me.”

During his first game as Tift’s starting kicker, Ramirez immediately made an impact. He broke the Blue Devils’ record for longest field goal, a kick that went 52 yards against Warner Robins on Aug. 17. Ramirez broke Charlie Edward’s previous record of 50 yards, which was set in 2005.

In the last game of his varsity football career, Ramirez made it last a little longer. With 35 seconds remaining, he drilled a 38-yard field goal against Archer in the state quarterfinals, which sent the game to overtime.

At the time of the Warner Robins field goal, Ramirez was doubling as Tift County’s starting punter. So strong is his leg that soccer head coach Bobby Earls frequently used Ramirez, a goalkeeper, on free kicks on the Devils’ side of the field. On several occasions, the opposing keeper had to make a save on the attempt. His kicks after saves almost always spanned three-quarters of the field.

Anders estimated that 90 percent of Ramirez’s kickoffs went for touchbacks.

Ramirez actually kicked a longer field goal in a game than the one against Warner Robins. Playing for Tift’s junior varsity team in 2016, he made a 53-yard try against ThunderRidge (Col.) in a game played at the ESPN Wide World of Sports in Orlando, Fla. He scored his first varsity point as a freshman against Alcovy in 2015.

Ramirez made eight field goals, all of them coming in 2018. He kicked 53 extra points during his Tift County career, 47 of them as a senior. Though he was only the team’s primary kicker for one season, Ramirez ranks in the top seven in Tift County history for career field goals and extra point kicks.

Region 1-AAAAAAA named him its first team kicker in 2018. The Georgia Sports Writers Association named him second team All-State, also for the 2018 season.

On the soccer field, Ramirez started in net for three years. He posted five shutouts during the 2019 season. He was named first team all-region in that sport in 2018 after an honorable mention selection in 2017. This season’s awards have not been announced yet.

Based in Murfreesboro, Middle Tennessee is a Division I program and plays in Conference USA. The squad went 8-6 last season and fell to Appalachian State in the New Orleans Bowl.