The562’s Poly and football coverage for the 2026-27 school year is sponsored by Long Beach Poly alums Wendell “WoWo” Moe, Jr. & Tyson Ruffins.
Photos by John Napalan
It’s hard to imagine a high school sophomore making his varsity debut to more anticipation and excitement than Long Beach Poly’s quarterback Trevor Scott did last week against Lakewood. A 6-5, 210-pound lefty, Scott held scholarship offers from UCLA, Arizona, Kansas and others despite not yet having thrown a Friday night pass.
Scott transferred to Poly from Mater Dei before this season, and had to sit for the last six weeks as mandated by the CIF Southern Section’s Sit Out Period rule. As he sat, Poly’s offense sputtered, putting up just 56 points in five losses to highly-ranked Yorba Linda, Tustin, Carson, Inglewood, and Rancho Cucamonga. The lack of scoring and downfield explosiveness was particularly frustrating given that Poly is sitting on a half-dozen receiver options with Division 1 offers.
So when Scott took the field against Lakewood, it was with high expectations—or perhaps hopes—from the large and highly invested Poly football community.
“I think a lot of the buildup came from us being 1-5 because people knew we didn’t have all our guys due to the SOP and injuries,” said Patterson. “So a lot of people were giving us a second chance—we get you’re 1-5 but when you get your guys back you better make sure they are who you think they are. A lot of people talked about the QB play in that stretch and obviously Trevor has the measurables, he hasn’t taken a varsity snap yet but he has offers to those expectations are high that he’s a legit QB with offers who passes the eye test.”
All Scott did in his first game with Poly was go 15/20 for 289 yards and five touchdowns passing, plus 49 yards rushing on the ground. The Jackrabbits had entered the game with just four passing touchdowns in their first six games to go along with six interceptions and two fumbles lost from the QB position.
Scott’s performance set off a social media frenzy of excited Long Beach football fans, eager to see Poly’s elite skill players paired with an equally elite QB. It was the kind of reaction that only happens for a few high school football programs in the country, and it would be understandable if Scott spent a good chunk of the weekend feeling pretty good about himself.
Instead? He shrugged it off.
“I haven’t been really looking at any comments, I don’t want to pump my head up, I just want to stay level-headed,” he said. “My parents told me not to get into any of that stuff. But it was very fun just being able to be back on the field and show what I can do.”
Often players in their first varsity game can look a little overwhelmed, certainly when playing QB for the first time at that level. But Scott looked cool, calm and collected all game. He credited Poly’s high-powered defense for helping him to prepare.
“I was practicing against an elite defense for the last six weeks, so the game felt easy,” he said. “I was just excited to get out there and play my game.”
It has been a journey for Scott to get to that game, a journey that’s a lot longer than just the six weeks he had to sit this season. Scott was the best athlete at Hughes Middle School as an eighth grader two years ago, leading the Owls to an All-City Middle School basketball championship. He then went to Mater Dei for his freshman year, before deciding to transfer back to his home school at 1600 Atlantic.
“What made me come back home was knowing how close the school is, and all my friends are there,” he said. “Being able to play with all my friends and family is great—my dad, my aunties, my sister, and several of my cousins went to Poly. So for our family it represents more than just a school.”
Scott is a student in Poly’s CIC magnet and said he plans to play basketball as well as football for as long as possible.
“Football is where my heart is at for sure, but I’ve been playing basketball since I was very young, my mom played basketball and I started that first,” he said. “Me playing both is just me trying to be a kid as long as I can because I know that won’t happen in college.”
For someone who plays multiple sports at a high level, the last six weeks were difficult for Scott—but he also didn’t want to waste the time he spent waiting to play. He put in a lot of work at practice and during games making sure he had mastery of Poly’s offense, and a strong relationship with talented receivers like Jayden Coley and Zion Anderson.
“I was able to take a lot of mental reps, and I knew my time was coming so I didn’t want to take a break and then underperform when it was my time,” he said. “I worked hard on footwork and on the offense every day—being able to write the board and know our concepts forward and backwards.”
Scott said on Monday of the Lakewood week, there was a charge through the whole campus knowing that the whole team was going to be playing. UCLA commit JuJu Johnson returned from injury to join fellow five-star Miami commit Donte Wright, and the transfers were eligible including Scott and sophomore linebacker Jace Lockett, who had four tackles for a loss in the game.
“The whole day was great, right when we walked into school everyone’s talking about having our full team,” he said. “That whole week was energetic, we practiced really hard all week too…I was just so eager to get out there.”
What he did on the field impressed. Granted, Poly will face tougher defenses, but Scott’s poise was perhaps more impressive than his stat line. On his first touchdown pass, he rolled out to his left on a 4th and 5 and looked like he could have run for the first down. Instead he saw Coley rolling with him and motioned him to turn upfield, where he easily lofted it to him for a 26-yard score.
“One of the things we spoke about was if you want to play in college, they don’t want to just see that you’re 6-5 and you’re taking off running,” said Patterson. “If you get the opportunity to scramble, keep your eyes downfield. Colleges know you can run, show them how you throw—that pass let you know he was ready to play.”
Asked if he was surprised by how composed Scott looked in his first game, Patterson chuckled.
“I was honestly a little surprised about how poised he was, but I can’t say I was caught off guard because the kid puts in a ton of preparation, a ton of work with his father training, I knew he’d be prepared,” he said. “But the composure in the pocket in his first varsity football game, big crowd, where he has the reins of the offense and it was under his control—I was impressed by that. He slowed the game down.”
Patterson said what he’s seen from Scott led him to have high expectations.
“He treats the game like a professional,” he said. “He’s always on time, he leads in everything he does even as a sophomore. He understands that as a QB you have to be a leader and he took that responsibility on the minute he walked into Poly. I respected that. It gave me an idea of who he was going to be and he’s lived up to it.”
Expectations are sky high for Scott and the young talent of the Jackrabbits, who will return most of their starters for the next season or two. His performance last week has fueled those expectations, with some on social media comparing him to Poly great Chris Lewis—also a CIC student and two-sport athlete who rewrote the state record book for the Jackrabbits in the late 90s and early 2000s.
Scott shrugged off any comparisons.
“I’m aware that there’s a lot of excitement,” he said. “I just want to put on for the city.”
Patterson is a Poly alum who’s aware of the intensity of Poly football fans, who can go from wanting an entire coaching staff fired one week to saying they found the next Chris Lewis the next.
“It’s natural to compare any Poly QB to Chris Lewis because he was our truly great QB,” he said. “It’s easy to compare him, including that he has the athletes around him like Chris did with Kareem, Samie, Andre and the backfield with Herman and Herschel. Trevor has a high level of talent surrounding him too. But I wouldn’t put too much pressure on him. Allow him to grow into who he is as Trevor Scott.”
