<\/p>\n
In the last game of the first round, Poly looked good on their home court in a sweep of the second-place Millikan Rams, 26-24, 25-22, and 25-20. <\/span>The win sews up the first half of league play with Poly at 5-0 and in first, while Millikan falls to 3-2, in a tie with Lakewood for third (Wilson’s in second at 4-1 after sweeping Lakewood today). <\/span><\/p>\n Strangely, it was Poly’s first home game of the league schedule, which the Rabbits and coach Vuthy Cheav must be celebrating now\u2014they’ll have big-time rematches against Wilson and Lakewood on their home court in the second round. <\/span>In any event, Poly made themselves right at home in the Ron Palmer Pavilion, outworking and overpowering the Rams even without top hitter John La Rusch (who sat with an abdominal strain that’s nagged him) and starting setter Garrett Covey, out with a sore neck.<\/p>\n Libero Brenden Togioka replaced Covey (at the position he played as a freshman) and was excellent for the Rabbits, orchestrating an efficient, varied attack on the net. <\/span>He set starting middle Jolon Clark up for 15 kills (Clark also had 4 blocks), and Patrick Noble performed admirably in an elevated role, with 11 kills.<\/p>\n “They all stepped up,” said Cheav after the game. <\/span>“Our role players know how to contribute and get the job done.”<\/p>\n It was a disappointing step back for Millikan and coach Greg Kautz, who pulled off a surprising upset with a sweep of Lakewood in their last match. <\/span>“We didn’t show any heart today,” said Kautz, whose team committed numerous errors. <\/span>Questioned as to the reason for the team’s lack of focus, he said, “I don’t think they realize how good they are.”<\/p>\n The Rams held a 24-23 lead in the first game, but committed a service error on game point, followed by a swing into the net, and a line violation to lose the game. <\/span>They held a 5-1 lead in the first set and a 4-1 lead in the second but were caught midway both times; they never led in the third.<\/p>\n Poly will start Round 2 this Thursday by hosting Cabrillo, while Millikan will host Wilson; both games will start around 4pm.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In the last game of the first round, Poly looked good on their home court in a sweep of the second-place Millikan Rams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-1407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1407\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1407"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=1407"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}