This time last year, Cody Stoever accounted for 470 of Wimberley High School’s 477 total yards in the state semifinals against Bellville. And he would’ve traded them all away for just one more inch on the final two-point conversion try that fell short.

He’s rewatched the play from every angle. He takes the direct snap and sprints to overtime through an opening on the left side. Then his legs are wrapped up, momentum stops, and he extends the ball over the goal line. Or, so he thought.

“Till the day I die, I’ll be telling my kids I was in on that two-point conversion,” Stoever said.

There are two different versions of Cody Stoever. There’s the class clown in the locker room that’s constantly razzing Wimberley head coach Doug Warren’s music choices on the weight room aux (Warren, Stoever insists, plays the same five songs, most notably September by Earth, Wind & Fire). And then there’s Stoever with the lights on and the helmet strapped, the quarterback who’s thrown for 2,660 yards and 32 touchdowns and compiled 1,400 of the angriest rushing yards and 26 touchdowns, beelining for a defensive back to run over, refusing to go out of bounds. Like every run can overcome the inches he didn’t get last year to win a state championship.

And that’s how he’s powered a Wimberley team that had to replace three wide receivers and three offensive linemen back to where they were last year, knocking on the state championship’s door.

“When he runs over a safety or stiff-arms somebody and throws them to the ground, everybody gets fired up,” Warren said. “They take on that same mentality.”

The team’s fortunes rest on Stoever's shoulders, the reigning District 13-4A MVP, and Stoever insists on lowering that shoulder into a linebacker’s face. So sometimes Warren will suggest not taking that extra hit, to preserve himself. And Stoever always responds the same way.

“That’s not me.”

In the state title game against Carthage in his sophomore year, Stoever broke the thumb on his throwing hand and played the entire second half because he didn’t tell any of the players or coaches. That semifinal last year when he had 98.5 percent of the team’s yards? He did so with a broken wrist and ligaments torn off the bone.

To him, that willingness to play through injury defines the Wimberley football he grew up with. His older brother, Cade, was a star wide receiver who went on to play four seasons at UTSA. Cody saw Cade, seven years older, play his final high school game with a shattered hand - and catch an 84-yard touchdown pass on the second play.

His older brother has always been his best friend and biggest mentor. Cody used to join in on all of Cade’s neighborhood football games, even though his brother’s friends had all long since hit puberty and were soon to suit up at Wimberley. Once, he ran a route across the middle and caught a drag route, only to turn and come face-to-face with Cade’s linebacker friend.

“He just lit me up, completely clotheslined me,” Stoever said.

Cody lay flat on his back, blood gushing from his nose, and ran inside, crying to his parents. His parents dabbed the blood and sent him back out there. You know what you’re getting yourself into, they told Cody. If you want to play with the big boys, you can’t complain when you get hurt.

“That’s all I wanted to do, was be a part of the Wimberley Texans football team,” Stoever said.

At that young age, he learned what it took to be a Wimberley football player. He had to be a warrior. 

He can’t look into the future and tell you the result of Friday night’s game against La Vega (11-3), but he can make one promise.

“There’s never a time where I’m going to take it easy,” Stoever said.