For the second time in a month, Durango spent the weekend with back-to-back meetings against the Grand Junction schools, and the results were remarkably similar.

Friday’s loss to Grand Junction had the same final score and the same outcome as the first meeting, a 62-45 Tigers win. In Saturday’s game at Central High School (14-6, 3-4, the teams went back and forth late, just as they had in Durango’s 51-50 win two weeks ago. This time it took overtime, but Durango came out on top again with a 45-43 win.

Guy Bay led the Demons (11-6, 4-3 5A/4A Southwestern League) off the bench with 11 points. Orion Clay finished with nine points and Terrence Trujillo had seven in the bounce-back win.

“It’s always tough coming up here, so we can’t be too disappointed with a split,” Durango head coach Alan Batiste said in a phone interview with The Durango Herald. “It was one of those gritty wins that could have gone either way, and we took it in the end.”

Durango had a chance to make it a two-possession game and put it away in regulation, but a missed free throw gave the Warriors a chance to steal one at the end. However, a missed free throw with 1.7 seconds left sent the game to overtime.

Again, a missed Durango free throw opened the door for Central, but the Warriors (14-6, 3-4 SWL) couldn’t convert on a last second desperation play, and the Demons got the stop they needed to secure the win.

“We just kept going back and forth trading baskets,” Batiste said. “They had a chance in the end and tried the old Valparaiso play. They ran it perfectly and got a good look, but it didn’t go down. It’s a huge win for us.”

Durango will be back at home for a 7 p.m. Tuesday game against Montezuma-Cortez before facing Montrose and Fruita Monument next weekend.

jfries@durangoherald.com