How Messay Hailemariam Turned St. Frances from 1–39 Doormat into a National High School Football Power

From an Ethiopian immigrant walk-on at Maryland to the architect of a resource-starved Baltimore juggernaut, Hailemariam has rebuilt St. Frances into a national title contender and life-changing pipeline for his players

St. Frances head football coach Messay Hailemariam. / Overtime

Shortly after emigrating to Maryland from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Messay Hailemariam’s parents took him to a local football practice thinking they were signing him up for soccer. 

But once he donned his first set of pads, he fell in love with this new, foreign version of football and eventually developed, years later, into a decent high school wingback. 

An Unlikely, Undersize Division I Walk-On

But when he walked into the offices of the coaches at the University of Maryland standing 5-foot-7, weighing 150 pounds and told them he was going to make the Terrapins roster as a walk-on, they looked at the little kid who overflowed with irrational confidence and howled in amusement.

Of the 150 students who came out for the team in that Fall of 1992, only two were invited to join the practice squad. Hailemariam was one of them. 

After the dominant run of excellence he’s overseen as the head football coach of St. Frances Academy in Baltimore over the last few years, nobody’s laughing at him now. 

And those college coaches that once guffawed like Clarence the Barber in Coming to America? They’re now flooding him with daily texts and emails, regularly visiting the resource-challenged Black Catholic school on East Chase Street in the shadow of the old city jail, hoping that one of his prized players will soon come their way.

Taking Over a 1–39 Program No One Feared

When St. Frances contacted Hailemariam about accepting its head coaching position, he embraced the challenge of taking over a program that had gone 1-39 during its brief history to that point.

“They had lost 33 in a row, and that only win was a forfeit,” Hailemariam said. “And in my first two games as a head coach we lost by a combined 80 points. That third game, we had a miracle comeback to secure our first victory and then went on a 30-game winning streak, winning back-to-back MIAA C conference titles.”

Ten years ago, after making a move to the A conference, skipping the B Conference in the process, St. Frances was facing Gilman, the big MIAA bully on the block coached by Biff Poggi, who is currently serving as the interim head coach at the University of Michigan as they prepare to play Texas in the Citrus Bowl. 

Gilman was consistently ranked among the top programs in the country at that time, routinely sending its players to elite college powerhouse programs. 

The Poggi Partnership That Supercharged St. Frances

When the game was delayed due to lightning, Hailemariam approached Poggi, asking about the rumors that a contingent of Gilman faculty were complaining about the school’s emphasis on football. 

Poggi, a self-made hedge fund multimillionaire who was on St. Frances’ board of trustees was not a child of privilege and understood the struggle of growing up on the wrong side of the tracks in Baltimore.

“I asked him if he was about to leave, and he said he was considering it,” Hailemariam said. “I told him, if he decided to come over here, I’d step aside and be one of his assistants. I said, ‘Let’s get it going and get some kids some opportunities that they might not have otherwise. Let’s help them have a platform that they wouldn’t be able to access otherwise.’”

Poggi had been considering a change.

“No human being I have ever heard of has escaped death,” Poggi told ESPN in explaining his decision to leave Gilman for St. Frances. “We’re all going to the same place. And at some time all of us are going to ask ourselves the question: ‘What difference did we make for the least of them?’ ... I decided I did not want to water-ski behind yachts. I wanted to do something else.”

The independently wealthy Poggi, who has his own jet, a staggering array of profitable business investments and rose from a rugged neighborhood environment in true Horatio Alger-like fashion, after working in the finance industry after college, invested $2.5 million of his own money to upgrade the program, according to ESPN. Some of those funds went into purchasing and refurbishing townhomes that the school now uses to house players who come in from outside Baltimore, along with city residents from difficult financial and home circumstances.

When Dominance Made the Panthers a Target

In 2017, St. Frances finished 13-0 and ranked as the fourth-best team in the nation. They defeated their MIAA A conference opponents by a staggering margin, 342-50.

Suddenly, those conference teams decided to stop playing the Panthers.

“For years, we used to get beat and take some serious whippings,” Hailemariam said. “I wasn’t crying or complaining, nor was my team. We took it. Our coaches and players showed up every day determined to get better. It was cool with everybody when Gilman was destroying everybody in the league. But when the poor, little Black Catholic school was doing it, all of a sudden it was a problem.”

Life After Poggi: Keeping a National Schedule Alive

When Poggi left the program to become Jim Harbaugh’s associate head coach at Michigan and took his considerable resources with him after the 2020 season, he handed the reins back to Hailemariam. 

He also handed over a Rolodex with corporate and individual donor contacts to make sure that the necessary funds for St. Frances’ national travel, while playing one of the toughest schedules in the country in order to compete for national championships, kept rolling in. That tab runs approximately $300,000 a year. 

More Than the NFL: Degrees, Scholarships and Second Chances

And as proud as he is of current alums in the NFL such as Los Angeles Rams running back Blake Corum, who won a national championship at the University of Michigan in 2023, and Tampa Bay Buccaneers linebacker Chris Braswell, who played his college ball at Alabama, Hailemariam is equally proud of the 50 or so St. Frances football alums who’ve gone on to earn Master’s Degrees. 

Every graduating senior from this year’s team, highlighted by elite national recruits Zion Elee, Kmari Bing and Jireh Edwards who’ll play next year at Maryland, Ohio State and Alabama respectively, will be attending college on full scholarships. 

This 2025 team will be remembered as one of the greatest and most dominant defensive squads in prep football history.

After St. Frances’ 37-20 victory over Corner Canyon, the three-time defending Utah state champions, to capture the inaugural Overtime Nationals championship, I sat with Hailemariam to get his thoughts on the road that he, and the school that he loves, has traveled. 

Q&A with Messay Hailemariam

How are you feeling right now, just a few hours removed from winning the first Overtime Nationals?

“I’m doing some self care right now, getting a pedicure. My feet were looking like a bombed out neighborhood in Beirut.”

You guys have been one of the top programs in the country over the last few years but had some uncharacteristic struggles two years ago. How have you managed to bounce back?

“We made it through that storm knowing that better days were ahead. We had so many injuries, especially on the offensive line, and yet we still almost beat Mater Dei and IMG that year. We just had to hit the re-set button and build some depth so we’d be able to weather a similar storm in the future.”

Talk about the growth of Zion Elee, who arrived at St. Frances from a small school in Harford County and left as the No. 1 edge rusher recruit in the nation.

“Zion came over to us from Joppatowne High School and after being with us for three weeks, he became a Five-Star recruit. He always had the tools, though. He’s 6-foot-4, 235 pounds and runs a 4.35 forty-yard dash. His combine numbers last year as a junior would’ve placed him in the top five percent at the NFL combine. He’s just a special athlete, a special talent and a special young man.”

How do you try to top what this team has accomplished next year, and in the years ahead?

“Our expectation is to win the national championship every year. We’re losing 26 seniors, all of whom are going to be on a college football roster next year. Twenty of them have already committed and the remaining six will sign by February 2nd. I’m a little bit nervous. But in our junior class, we have 11 players committed to D-I schools already. There are a lot of players returning that are motivated and excited to continue building on the St. Frances legacy.”

I’ve been around you, your players and your program for years, and yet I’m still amazed that given your lack of resources with no field, no tackling dummies, no blocking sleds, etc, you’re able to compete at this very elite level year after year. Talk about that.

“Some schools play in $50 million stadiums and have indoor practice facilities, and we’re scrambling sometimes to find fields to practice at and working out transportation to get our guys over there. We’re chasing after things that we need to overcome that other elite programs don’t have to worry about. It can be stressful, but life can be stressful at times. It’s a life lesson that our players get some real experience with early on.” 

Break that down.

You have to play the hand that you’re dealt, don’t use it as an excuse and find a way to win. God will give you everything you need and not everything you want. Now how do you maximize that? That’s a question we deal with every day. That’s life. And being a part of our program teaches our guys about life in the best way possible. How do you use what you have to get where you want? You’re going to incur some losses along the way. But learning how to be humble and deal with losing, that’s the lesson. Because losing, if you learn and grow from it, is a great motivator to get you where you want to get to.”

What was something you did on the day of the Overtime Nationals game that people wouldn’t think you’d be doing?

“I scheduled four games for next year against some of the top teams in the country while looking at our roster and thinking ahead. We want to raise all of our players so they can grow with us over the years but sometimes that’s not enough. That’s the reality, so we’re looking at some great players that might be interested in transferring in because we can’t afford to not be competitive. Now we don’t have to be perfect, but we have to maintain our standard of being ready to strap up against any and everybody.”

For the last few years, you guys closed your season against IMG. That was one of the most highly anticipated games in the country on the high school level. How did you feel when they pulled out of this year’s game?

“To say that we were devastated would be an understatement. IMG vs St. Frances has become a great national football rivalry. We look forward to that game every year. And over the last six years, we’ve split the series with each of us winning three games. Everything seemed to line up perfectly. Overtime was in the process of building this initial event that would eventually become a playoff series to determine a true high school national champion.”

They gave a few reasons why they decided not to play, which we won’t belabor here. I just want to know, in your heart, why do you think they pulled out? 

“I think they were very strategic. The game was going to be nationally televised and they knew what they were up against. They weren’t the Goliath anymore, not in this game. We’re the poor school from Baltimore with no facilities and IMG has this mystique. They’re worth over $1 Billion. St. Frances might be worth $1 million on a good day, depending on if the roof or the building needs some repairs. But we’ll always match their talent. I just feel like they did their kids a disservice, because if you want to be considered the best, you have to compete against the best and prove it. And they didn’t give their kids that opportunity. That’s my opinion.”

I know there have been overtures from college coaches asking if you’d be interested in joining their staffs. Do you have any interest in one day making that jump?

“I’ll be here at St. Frances until the wheels fall off. I don’t think coaching on the major college level is for me. This is my calling, working with these coaches and these players during their formative years. We get a chance to change the trajectory of someone’s life. This is my purpose. I’m at peace with what God is doing with me.”