For starters, Servite slams Long Beach Poly

LONG BEACH – Servite already had one No. 1 ranking coming into this season. The Friars surely added another top ranking Thursday.

Servite decisively beat Long Beach Poly, 30-7, in the season opener for both at Veterans Stadium.

The Friars were ranked No. 2 in the CIF-Southern Section Pac-5 Division poll. The No. 1 team? Two-time defending division champion Long Beach Poly.

Poly coach Raul Lara thought that Servite was the real No. 1 team all along, and Thursday's game confirmed his opinion.

"I told everybody when we won Pac-5 last year to watch out for Servite," Lara said. "They had a lot of guys coming back, and that quarterback is awesome."

That quarterback, Servite senior Cody Fajardo, completed his first 11 passes. He finished 16 for 23, for 146 yards with one touchdown and an interception. He also led the Friars in rushing with 43 yards, and ran for a touchdown.

Eleven of those 16 completions were for fewer than 10 yards. Poly's cornerbacks gave Servite receivers a 7-yard cushion all night, and the Friars' short-passing game started productively and remained so.

"We knew their corners were going to play deep," Fajardo said. "So we thought we'd hit them short, and then they would come up and we'd then throw a couple deep ones. But they never came up, so we took the dinkers and scored 30 points on them."

Seven different Servite receivers caught passes. Senior Rudy Guerrero had six receptions for 89 yards, and junior Robert Abeyta had four for 28. Senior Chris Nicholls caught a 4-yard touchdown pass, scored on a 25-yard run and added a crucial, long kickoff return.

The Friars defense matched Poly's famous speed. Poly sophomore quarterback Dylan Lagarde was harassed consistently to complete only seven of his 22 passes for 34 yards. Poly's running game yielded only 23 yards on 20 carries.

Defensive leaders for Servite were junior linebacker Matthew Inman and senior lineman Kirifi Taula. Both had sacks, as did senior lineman David Perez.

Special teams stood out, too, and produced the game's first points.

Servite took a 2-0 lead on a safety midway through the first quarter. A sack by Servite senior defensive lineman Kirifi Taula pushed Poly back to its 6-yard line for a fourth down. Friars senior Rudy Guerrero blocked the punt attempt in the end zone, and the ball bounced out of the back of the end zone for the two points.

Poly had to kick off from its 20, and Nicholls returned it from the Friars' 26 to Poly's 40. A quick drive down field led to a 4-yard touchdown pass from Fajardo to Nicholls for a 9-0 lead with four minutes left in the first quarter.

Servite made it 16-0 early in the second quarter. On third and 3 at the Poly 3, Fajardo rolled left, found no open receivers and then ran untouched through a large gap into the end zone.

Long Beach Poly scored with 46 seconds left in the half on a 9-yard run by Michael Simmons. Completions of 17 and 20 yards from Lagarde to sophomore receiver Josiah Blandin kept the drive going.

After a scoreless third quarter, Servite sophomore running back Sean DeRosa scored on the first play of the fourth on a 5-yard run to make it 23-7. Nicholls scored on a 25-yard run around the left end to push the Friars' lead to the final 30-7 tally.

Poly's Lara was impressed.

"Actually, they just kicked our behinds," he said.