For Sycamore head coach Joe Ryan’s potential final game, it did not start off as planned.

After the 4½-hour trek down to Cahokia outside St. Louis, a fumble on the first offensive drive and a 14-point deficit put the Spartans in a hole, but as Ryan said after the game, it’s never a dull moment with this group.

Sycamore rallied to take a two-touchdown lead in the second half before losing it in the fourth quarter. A drive in the final 5½ minutes set up some heroics.

Trailing by one point with 32 seconds remaining, junior kicker Josh Puleo stepped up when his number was called and nailed a 32-yard field goal to give the Spartans a 30-28 victory over the Comanches for their fifth win of the season and a playoff berth.

“We are in the show. We fought hard this year,” Ryan said. “We’ve had some tough ups and downs, and we played a really good team tonight, and found a way to win. I thought our kids played their tails off.

“I told them they aren’t getting rid of me yet. That’s awesome, but I want to keep coaching as long as I can this year with this group, then go from there. All the credit to these kids. They did a great job.”

On that final fourth-quarter drive, the ball was downed all the way back on the Sycamore 14-yard line with 5:30 remaining on the clock. The three-headed running attack of seniors Kevin Lee and Cooper Bode, along with junior Liam Arhos, ran the ball down the field to the Cahokia 20-yard line. The drive consisted of 14 plays, mostly led by Arhos, who had nine rushes in the drive.

One mishap saw quarterback Griffen Larsen recover a fumble to keep the drive alive. On fourth and 9 with 32.1 seconds remaining, the Comanches jumped offside, giving Puelo fewer yards to hit the game-winning field goal. The junior said he was ready for the moment.

“I am always ready for that. You just have to put (the pressure) behind you and go out there and do it,” Puelo said. “It was good. I just wanted to celebrate with my team and go home and get ready for the playoffs.”

That first-quarter deficit was created by some open-field athleticism by Cahokia, including a 77-yard run by Machai Henderson to give the Comanches a 14-0 lead midway through the quarter. But the Spartans stuck to the game plan, creating plenty of misdirection to put Cahokia on their heels.

Less than a minute into the second quarter, Bode scored the first of his three touchdowns on the day, scoring on a 10-yard run. After Cahokia punted on its next drive, Sycamore put together an 11-play, 88-yard drive, capped by Lee’s touchdown run from a yard out.

“I think we were just going to try and smack them in the mouth and run the ball, and tire them out and win,” Lee said. “I think that is the best we have looked all year from a run-game standpoint. I am really proud of the line.”

Sycamore trailed 14-12 at halftime before starting the third quarter on a 12-play drive, capped by another Bode touchdown run. This time, it was from 4 yards out. After Sycamore recovered a fumble on the Comanches’ next drive and Arhos’ 58-yard burst put Sycamore on the 5-yard line, Bode punched it in to give the Spartans a 27-14 lead.

“We had no doubt in our minds. We knew we had a game plan and we knew what we were going to do, and there was no doubt that we could execute,” Bode said. “The team was on a high. We were up. The O-line was blocking great, and the holes, a truck could fit through it, so I was just doing my job running the ball. Everyone was doing their job, and we were rolling.”

Cahokia came back with two passing touchdowns in the fourth quarter to set up the Spartans for the final drive. Despite the momentum on the Comanches’ side, the Spartans held strong, stuck to the game plan and set up a chance for Puleo’s heroics.

“Josh is a kid who has been out for us, but he has never been a kicker,” Ryan said. “He just kept working on it and working on it. I looked at him and go, ‘Can you make 37?’ and he goes, ‘I can do it’. So I brought him out there, and they jumped (offside). But I think he hit that one 40-something. He crushed it, so that was awesome.”

After the made field goal, Cahokia drove the ball down to the 17-yard line, setting up a chance to win the game before a holding call pushed them back 10 yards. An 11-yard run by quarterback Nigel Gooden put Cahokia back to the 16-yard line as the clock wound down, and with the Comanches out of timeouts, the clock expired with Sycamore as the victors. The win was the team’s fifth win of the season, moving them into the IHSA Playoffs.

Arhos led the way with 212 yards on 20 carries, which included runs of 60 yards and 58 yards, respectively. Lee had 27 rushes for 135 yards and that second-quarter touchdown, while Bode scored three rushing touchdowns and finished with 53 yards on 10 carries.

“For the ups and downs we’ve had this season, to come on the road and travel 4½ hours, leave at 10 o’clock this morning, play a full 48-minute game, to win it to go into the playoffs, shows a lot to these kids to continue to believe in us all year long,” Ryan said. “And we stayed together, and it’s a testament to them.”