{"id":281546,"date":"2026-04-23T05:41:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T05:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/281546\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T05:41:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T05:41:08","slug":"millikan-clinches-outright-moore-league-title-with-sweep-over-long-beach-poly-the562-org","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/281546\/","title":{"rendered":"Millikan Clinches Outright Moore League Title with Sweep Over Long Beach Poly \u2013 The562.org"},"content":{"rendered":"

The562\u2019s coverage of Long Beach Poly Athletics for the 2025-26 school year is sponsored by Former Jackrabbits Wendell \u201cWoWo\u201d Moe, Jr. & Tyson Ruffins.<\/a><\/p>\n

The562\u2019s coverage of Millikan Athletics for the 2025-26 school year is sponsored by Brian Ramsey and TLD Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When asked about Millikan\u2019s hopes of winning a Moore League championship earlier this season, coach Matthew Johnson smiled before offering a humble answer: \u201cOur goal is to not lose a set.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those words were cemented into the history books on Wednesday evening, as Millikan completed an undefeated Moore League championship without losing a single set, capping it with a 25-21, 25-17, 25-23 sweep at Long Beach Poly. The win breaks a 20-year drought for Millikan since its last league championship in 2006.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s unreal,\u201d Johnson said after the match. \u201cI\u2019m proud of these guys. I love that they believed me when I told them my goal for this season. They did it. They believed the whole way, even when we were down at times, and I heard them saying the stuff I normally say: play together, play for each other, shake off the mistakes. It\u2019s just all really exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s finally been Millikan\u2019s turn this season in what\u2019s been a carousel of talent in the Moore League boys\u2019 volleyball scene. The Rams have struck a balance of skill and experience from top to bottom of their roster, led by their senior core of outside hitters Jake Karkanen and Kobe Magdael along with middle blocker Evan Crucil-Chambers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey call themselves \u2018The Big Three,\u2019\u201d Johnson said of the seniors. \u201cYou can see their leadership on and off the court. Guys look to them in the tough moments and if they\u2019re not shaken then nobody\u2019s shaken. The young guys have been feeding off of them and they\u2019ve been playing like experienced veterans.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Big Three proved big once again against Poly on Wednesday, as Karkanen and Magdael combined for 14 kills at the pins along with an ace from Magdael. Most of Crucil-Chambers\u2019 impact came on the defensive end of the net, as he got in on five of the team\u2019s eight total blocks to go along with three kills and an ace.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of times theres games like this as a middle where you\u2019re not in system, and you have to think like, \u2018how can I make a difference?\u2019 I just decided tonight that my difference-maker would be blocking,\u201d Crucil-Chambers said. \u201cMy approach was just to go up, press straight, don\u2019t get tooled, and I think I did a pretty good job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crucil-Chambers was in on a pair of blocks to open the match, which set the tone for what was a dominant first two sets. The Rams opened the match on a 6-2 run and held that lead for the entire first set before leading wire-to-wire again in the second, with help from a five-point service run from Magdael that included a kill and an ace.<\/p>\n

Poly held its only lead of the match in the third set after a 6-0 run with Wyatt Sheetz at the service line gave the Jackrabbits a 19-17 lead. The teams traded blows as Millikan worked its way back, eventually trailing 23-22. The Rams then went on a three-point run to close out the set, taking the court to celebrate their first Moore League championship in 20 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been talking about this since we were freshmen,\u201d Crucial-Chambers said of his Big Three. \u201cIt was the goal all along and it feels really good, I can\u2019t lie.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just a lot of joy. It\u2019s honestly better than how we imagined it because it was Poly. Poly and Wilson have been the top teams the past few years so it\u2019s been fun to play them and end up on top,\u201d added Karkanen.<\/p>\n

The CIF-SS boys\u2019 volleyball brackets will be released this weekend, with the first round set to begin Tuesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The562\u2019s coverage of Long Beach Poly Athletics for the 2025-26 school year is sponsored by Former Jackrabbits Wendell…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":281547,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-281546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281546"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281546\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}