Photos taken from Poly football social media pages
The long and winding saga of football transfers in the CIF Southern Section this Fall has taken another dramatic twist. Long Beach Poly transfer Kevin Alexander II, who was initially one of the players ruled ineligible and banned from high school sports in California for two years, has now been approved to play and is immediately eligible for the Jackrabbits. Alexander II is expected to play this evening against Cabrillo.
The CIF-SS confirmed that Alexander was now eligible due to a hardship transfer.
Alexander is the first player to be re-granted eligibility after a long run of players losing eligibility. The linebacker/defensive end finds himself in the unique position of gaining eligibility for two games as well as the playoffs, while seeing kids all over the region still banned for the rest of the season and beyond. More than 40 football transfers across Southern California were denied eligibility and given two-year bans from any high school sports in California, including 19 players at Bishop Montgomery.
More locally, eight players at Millikan were ruled ineligible, causing them to forfeit two games; six players at Poly were ruled ineligible, leading to the forfeit of one game; and one player at Compton was banned as well.
Poly’s forfeit of its win over Tustin will stand, as the ineligible player who participated in that game is still listed as “Denied.” Alexander had yet to suit up for the Jackrabbits this year.
The Jackrabbits had previously had six transfers denied eligibility by the CIF Southern Section office this season. All of those players had been submitted to the CIF-SS transfer portal as “Sit Out Period” transfers, meaning that they weren’t playing while awaiting the Sit Out Period date–before finding out they’d been ruled ineligible.
The issue has become widespread throughout the region and certainly in Long Beach. In addition to the players banned under Bylaw 202 (falsifying documents), at Poly, Millikan and Compton, there have been other players deemed ineligible at other schools. A Jordan transfer was ruled “limited eligibility” by the CIF-SS three weeks ago, restricting him to JV or lower levels play only. Last year, Wilson had five transfers listed as “denied” and ineligible at Wilson for a year due to following a head coach from one school to another.
Lakewood has been the local school that’s taken in the least transfers–this year they have just three school-wide thus far. That’s prevented the Lancers from having eligibility issues this year; one Lakewood player who transferred out of the school to Bishop Montgomery is among the banned players there who is now playing out of state in Arizona.
At a recent CIF-SS council meeting Commissioner Mike West said “We had a real influx of fraudulent paperwork. It’s been significant and very disheartening” according to the LA Times. West also mentioned that the CIF office has become “very adept at identifying” fraudulent transfer information.
When asked about what methods the CIF office is using, assistant commissioner Thom Simmon said in an email, “I would not want to get into specifics on that information. I will simply say that we are using all means necessary.”
