Long Beach Poly Is New Monarch in Division I

Long Beach Poly’s football team made a convincing public statement Saturday night.

The Jackrabbits won the Southern Section Division I championship and put the finishing touches on a perfect season by defeating defending champion Santa Ana Mater Dei, 28-25, before 14,121 at the Coliseum.

Long Beach Poly (14-0) ended Mater Dei’s 27-game winning streak and became the first public school to win the section’s largest division since 1993, and only the second since 1989.

Junior Chris Lewis completed 11 of 16 passes for 261 yards and three touchdowns for Long Beach Poly, which won its first title since 1985, when the Jackrabbits shared the Big Five Conference championship with Huntington Beach Edison.

Senior Herman Ho-Ching gained 69 yards in 13 carries, caught two passes for 98 yards and scored three touchdowns against a Mater Dei defense that was giving up only 9.6 points a game.

“We’ve been waiting a long time to get here and we did it by beating Mater Dei,” said Ho-Ching, who clinched the victory when he recovered an onside kick with 1:40 left and returned it to the Mater Dei four. “They were the best. Now we’re the best. You better believe it.”

Long Beach Poly, which lost to the Monarchs, 42-13, in last year’s semifinals, beat Mater Dei (13-1) with the quick-strike, big-play attack that characterized their other playoff victories over Fountain Valley, Redlands and Loyola.

Trailing, 17-14, at halftime, Poly took the second-half kickoff and scored on its fourth play from scrimmage on a 32-yard screen pass from Lewis to Ho-Ching. The two combined for a 66-yard scoring play on a screen pass in the first half.

Later in the third quarter, Lewis hit Andre Cyrus on a 76-yard touchdown pass play that gave the Jackrabbits all they would need.

Mater Dei’s Mike McNair rushed for 151 yards in 31 carries and scored two touchdowns, but he did most of his damage in the first half. Monarch quarterback Justin Leonard completed only eight of 24 passes for 97 yards.

Mater Dei’s Kevin Mitchell scored on a one-yard run with 1:48 left, and caught a two-point conversion pass from Leonard to pull Mater Dei to within 28-25.

Ho-Ching ended the threat when he recovered the onside kick.