The second chance against the Wildcats was even less kind to the Demons.
Durango High School’s baseball team opened its Southwestern League schedule on the road Friday at Fruita Monument in a rematch of the Piedra Vista Invitational Championship game played two weeks ago. The Demons lost that first contest 11-8, but Friday’s game wasn’t nearly as close. The Wildcats remained unbeaten (11-0, 2-0 SWL) with a 10-0 win in five innings.
“It was not a good game for us,” DHS head coach Eric Baker. “Fruita is a tough team and undefeated for a reason. They didn’t knock it all over the park on us, but we had errors and they had timely hits.”
Fruita Monument did all of its damage on nine hits and four DHS fielding errors. The Demons also dropped a routine fly ball in the outfield that by rule was a hit but Baker counted as a fifth fielding mistake.
“We didn’t play defense well enough,” he said.
DHS (4-4, 0-1 SWL) was held to two hits, a double by Hayden Sill and a single by Lawrence Mayberry.
Dayne Rowley started his second consecutive game on the mound for DHS. After picking up a win Tuesday against Denver North, Rowley didn’t get enough support to make it two wins in a week.
“He pitched reasonably well, throwing a lot of strikes and only giving away one walk,” Baker said. “We just didn’t play well enough behind him and didn’t get anything going at the plate.”
DHS will look to bounce back at 1 p.m. Saturday at Grand Junction Central (8-2, 2-0 SWL). Sill will start on the mound for DHS.
“You never want to put yourself in a hole in league. Central is pretty good this year, and we have to come out swinging and shake this one off and get the bats going again,” Baker said. “We need to scratch out a win.”
heraldsports@durangoherald.com
