The562’s coverage of Long Beach Poly is sponsored by Bryson Financial.
It’s been an up and down start to the season for the veteran Long Beach Poly boys’ basketball team, which is 5-4 with wins over Windward, Bishop Montgomery, and Corona Centennial–but also blowout losses to Harvard-Westlake, Sierra Canyon, and Santa Margarita. The Jackrabbits’ hopes of getting a run going in the Bosco Winter Classic were dashed on Friday night by an undefeated Fairmont Prep team, which was good enough to hold off a late Poly surge for a 57-55 victory.
“We’ve got to hit shots and we’ve got to have an inside presence,” said Poly coach Shelton Diggs. “We had that at times but we didn’t have it when we needed to, and we didn’t make enough shots when we needed to.”
The Jackrabbits fell behind 19-9 after the first quarter behind a barrage of long-distance shots from Fairmont Prep, which led 30-25, eventually hitting 10 3-pointers. Poly was able to narrow the gap even further in the third quarter as Julian Calderone came off the bench to hit three 3-pointers in the frame, which saw Poly trail just 45-42 going into the fourth.
Buckets from Jovani Ruff, Nana Ofoegbu and Austin Unegbu cut the lead, then a layup from Jonas Oware and a triple from Ofoegbu tied the game at 53-53 late. Unfortunately for Poly, Fairmont Prep retook the lead on the next possession. Poly ran a nice out-of-bounds play to get an open layup for Giovanni Ofoegbu that cut the lead to 56-55 with 1:46 left, but the Jackrabbits couldn’t get another basket to flip the score. Oware had a layup attempt that rimmed out, and Ruff’s would-be game-winning drive came up empty with time running out.
Ruff led the way with 13 points, backed up by 12 from Giovanni Ofoegbu, nine each from Oware and Calderone, and five each from Nana Ofoegbu and Unegbu.
The Jackrabbits will return to action in the Bosco Winter Classic Friday against Orange Lutheran at 5pm, while Fairmont Prep will face Damien at 8pm.
