Poly tackles loss with poise, honesty
Poly's John Smith finds a hole in the first half at Veterans Stadium in Long Beach on Friday night. The Jackrabbits lost 30-0 to Mater Dei.
Long Beach Poly's bench sits dejected in the closing minutes of the 30-0 loss to Mater Dei at Veterans Stadium in Long Beach on Friday night.
By Bob Keisser | Orange County Register
December 2, 2013 at 10:41 a.m.
There were few moments of visible anguish among Poly players, coaches and fans after Friday's 30-0 TKO at the hands of Mater Dei in the Pac-5 semifinals.
No tears, no emotional outbursts. The team meeting was short, and coach Raul Lara didn't have to say very much to his players other than they had a great season and there's never any shame in losing to Mater Dei.
John "JuJu" Smith, headed to a Pac-12 school near you, showed tremendous class during the postgame handshake line, taking the time to say something special and private to several Mater Dei players, even seeking out a few on his own to acknowledge their effort.
Quarterback Tai Tiedemann stood at midfield after the team meet broke up and was surrounded by his family, including his mom, who had him in a huge bear hug that put a smile on his face and reminded everyone that high school football is a game played by teenagers still evolving into young men.
Even in the stands, one could find Poly fans walking over to the Mater Dei side of the seats to say nice words.
Play the same team 10 times in the postseason during the past 18 seasons and it's hard not to gain respect for each other.
"It was tough," Lara said. "Real tough. It just wasn't our night. We had a great year, but our goal always is to win the Pac-5 and state. It didn't happen this time."
One can analyze what happened to the extreme and not be wrong: Mater Dei's defense challenged Poly's strength head on – the running game and a big offensive line – and the Jackrabbits were flummoxed as a result, unable to get out of their own way more often than not.
In terms of execution, the Monarchs outplayed the Jackrabbits throughout.
"We wanted to make them uncomfortable," Mater Dei coach Bruce Rollinson said.
They did so by putting nine players in the tightest defensive box you've ever seen and kept Poly from getting any decent push inside.
But Mater Dei also gained 165 yards on two scoring plays, which represented more than half of its 292 net yards.
Poly fumbled the ball away on its own 20 in the first half and at the Mater Dei 11 in the second, and threw an interception into the end zone in the fourth quarter.
That's five plays. Reverse them and maybe we're talking about Poly vs. Bosco Part Deux this week.
Lara conceded that he should have gone to a different tactic earlier than he did. Oddly, Poly's first notable play of the game was a flat pass to Smith that netted a first down. That play wasn't seen again.
In the second half, Smith was put in the backfield and broke a 20-yard run on his first carry that seemed to give the Jackrabbits some momentum for the first time all game. But the drive stalled.
Later in the third quarter, Poly finally got a big play, a 49-yard pass to Christian Pabico, but a fumbled snap ended that drive.
Lara adjusted to Mater Dei's plan to punt away from Smith by putting two return backs in on a punt. The Monarchs kicked to Jackie Jones, who was moving forward as he took the punt – and fumbled it away.
The one sure thing is that Poly will move on. It will miss Smith, an electric player, wide receiver Pabico and five key starters on defense – Joseph Wicker, Elijah Moody, Caleb Turner, Justin Fao and Imani Mitchell.
But it will return both running backs, Jeremy Calhoun and James Brooks, and quarterback Josh Love, and three stars on defense in Iman Marshall, Justin Calhoun and Omari Lyles.
Poly doesn't rebuild, it reloads – even after a game when Mater Dei took a sledgehammer to the foundation.
Contact the writer: bkeisser@lbregister.com
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Bob Keisser