This is Championship Central where you can relive the entire Long Beach Poly football season before their game against St. Francis in the CIF Southern Section Division 4 championship at St. Francis tonight. Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. and we’ll have live updates throughout. A limited number of tickets is available by clicking here.
Before kickoff, check out our preview of tonight’s CIF title game.
Take a look back at all of our Poly football coverage from the 2021-22 season that led them to the championship game!
Our season preview of this year’s Poly team
NONLEAGUE
The Jackrabbits had a 1-3 start to the season with a typically difficult non league schedule. They lost to Serra by one point in a season-opening thriller, then lost to Mission Viejo before getting their first win against Leuzinger. After that came a tough loss at the hands of Corona Centennial.
Football: Long Beach Poly Falls To Serra In Last-Second Thriller
MOORE LEAGUE
The Jackrabbits ran through the Moore League with the usual ease, except for an exciting and competitive game with Millikan.
The Jackrabbits opened up against the Rams with a 42-28 win and then easily defeated Wilson, Compton, Jordan, and Lakewood by a combined score of 185-6. One new wrinkle this year was that Cabrillo couldn't play due to a positive COVID test, so Poly had a road trip to Aquinas where they got a good look against an Aquinas team currently preparing to play for a Division 7 championship tonight. The Jackrabbits beat Aquinas 41-14.
Football: Long Beach Poly Survives Millikan Scare in Moore League Battle
PLAYOFFS
The Jackrabbits have rolled through the Division 4 playoffs. If you, like many fans, are curious as to why they're in Division 4, we explained the new CIFSS playoff format in this podcast. Essentially, the new playoff rating formula heavily emphasizes strength of schedule, and it underrated the Moore League. Poly was in Division 2 by the formula when their non league schedule wrapped--as they dominated Aquinas and the Moore League, they slipped down to become the top seed in Division 4.
Poly has made a statement about that placement. They beat Trabuco Hills 56-28 in their opener. They beat Upland 49-3. Last week they beat Cypress 35-0 in the program's first playoff shutout since the 2-0 semifinal win over O. Lu.
CIF Football: Long Beach Poly Locks Down Cypress, Headed to Championship Game
This week they got to practice on Thanksgiving, a time-honored tradition at Poly.
We've also written features about players from this Poly team, don't miss our stories on Donovan Poe, Shea Kuykendall, Jason Robinson, Daylen Austin, and Morgan State commits Wendell "WoWo" Moe and Donovan Turner.
