Chargers, Jackrabbits to meet once again
Mike Sciacca
There’s a history associated with Edison High and Long Beach Poly in
the CIF-Southern Section football playoffs, and the two well-known
programs will add another chapter to the story Friday night.
That’s when the Chargers, tri-champion of the Sunset League will
play host to the Jackrabbits, once again champion of the Moore
League, in a second-round Division I showdown at Orange Coast
College.
Kickoff is at 7 p.m.
The game will be the third postseason meeting between the schools
in the last three years.
Last November, Moore League champion Long Beach Poly opened the
playoffs with a 30-7 win over the Chargers, an at-large entry.
In December of 2001, the teams met at Edison International Field,
where the Jackrabbits staved off a determined Edison squad, 42-28, in
the Division I championship game.
“We’re no strangers when it comes to meeting in the playoffs,”
said Edison coach Dave White, who has led the Chargers in all but two
of their meetings with the Jackrabbits. “Poly has fielded some
outstanding teams over the years and they’ve been pretty awesome over
the last 15 years.”
Edison first met up with Poly in the postseason in 1982, where the
Jackrabbits scored a 21-17 semifinal victory over the Sunset champion
Chargers, then coached by Bill Workman.
Three years later, the teams met in the Big 5 championship game
and their title battled ended in a 14-14 tie.
They met up again in 1991 and this time, Edison, under White,
emerged victorious, its 13-6 first-round win eliminating Poly.
In 1995, Poly was a 40-14 first-round winner.
The Jackrabbits (9-2) entered the Division I 2003 playoffs
carrying the No. 1 seed. They survived St. John Bosco in a
first-round contest last Friday, 33-22.
Edison, meanwhile, improved to 8-3 with a 31-14 first-round triumph at A.B. Miller.
The Chargers reached into their bag of tricks against the Rebels,
using two double-pass plays to score touchdowns.
The first came in the second quarter, when Matt White and Nate
Mitani hooked up on a 62-yard scoring play. The second came in the
fourth quarter when Joshua Gage connected with White on an 18-yard
touchdown pass.
Gage also rushed for two touchdowns.
“I thought our kids played a great game,” White said of Friday’s
win. “I hope we can carry that over to the Poly game because it’s
imperative that we play near-perfect football, if we hope to beat
them.”
The game pits Edison’s stingy defense against a typically-fast and
speedy Jackrabbits offense.
Poly enters the game averaging 36 points on offense. On the other
side of the ball, Edison’s defense has yielded an average of 10
points per game.
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