SHARONVILLE — Sam Wiles said he felt much better when asked about his health earlier in the week.
You could tell he felt much better, too.
Nothing suggested the Lakota West High School senior had to stave off an illness or anything that would have prevented him from playing.
But Wiles — with a winning attitude and all — did exactly that. He went out there and led the Firebirds to a 20-14 comeback win at home against the Elder Panthers last Friday in the Division I regional quarterfinals.
“The dude had a 102-degree fever — sick as a dog,” Lakota West coach Tom Bolden said. “It was wild. He wanted it. He wanted it so bad.”
Wiles rushed for 125 yards and three touchdowns, two of which were in the fourth quarter. That gutsy performance set up the Firebirds’ regional semifinal meeting with the St. Xavier Bombers.
And just like last weekend, Wiles took to the turf at Princeton’s Pat Mancuso Field with a winner’s attitude — along with a clean bill of health.
“You might come in here and punch us in the mouth, but it’s not just me, it’s everyone,” Wiles said. “You will never get us down. With my team that I have, I’ve been playing with these guys since as long as I can remember. I know they had my back, and I didn’t want to let them down.
“No matter what they threw at me, I was going to persevere because I know my guys would do the same for me.”
It didn’t start the way Wiles had envisioned, yet St. Xavier’s 16-0 first-half lead didn’t seem to faze him either.
“We knew we had to do something big,” Wiles said. “We started slow, but we knew coming out of the locker room that we had to get something going.
“So, that’s what we did.”
Wiles threw a 5-yard touchdown pass to tight end Luka Gilbert, but the 2-point conversion attempt failed, and the Firebirds trailed the Bombers 16-6 with 10:08 left in the third.
Lakota West junior Braydon Johnson scored on a 4-yard plunge, and Kofi Adubofuor’s extra point brought it to within 16-13 with 29 seconds remaining on the third-quarter clock.
Wiles continued to watch his Firebird defense do what it has done the entire season, which is provide an opportunity for the offense.
Once Wiles got the ball back into his hands for what turned out to be Lakota West’s final drive, the senior did senior-type things.
“He willed some things to happen,” Bolden said. “Such a gutsy performance. He’s done it all year. The kid’s come so hard with his quarterback play. He can do it with his feet, and he throws it well enough.”
Wiles pulled off a couple drive-saving runs — one on fourth-and-long — to set up Adubofuor’s 49-yard, game-tying field goal attempt that had the distance but was wide left. St. Xavier took a knee to close it out.
Wiles finished with 144 yards rushing on Friday.
“We knew that last drive was all or nothing,” Wiles said. “Every one of my teammates out there put their bodies on the line — everything they had just one last time.
“We never wanted it to end,” Wiles continued while holding back tears. “We drove the ball. They were playing dirty. We were playing dirty. We were just playing football, man.
“But that last drive, we did everything we could have done to prove we belonged here, and we couldn’t have done that without our teammates.”
