The Durango girls soccer team is rounding into form at the right time of the season. The Demons haven’t lost a game since March 29 and only have two regular season games to go before the playoffs.
Meanwhile on the diamond, Durango baseball can’t seem to score and is in the midst of a five-game losing streak.
Durango girls soccer hit the road and won at Crested Butte 3-1 on Thursday. On Friday, the Demons won 1-0 at Fruita Monument and on Saturday Durango won at Grand Junction 2-0.
After finishing the weekend slate 3-0, Durango improved to 6-2-3 overall and 3-1-2 in the 4A/5A Southwestern League.
Durango girls soccer head coach Melissa Halonen said the team’s first half against Crested Butte was shaky. The Demons gave up a goal from 40 yards out off a silly turnover to go down 1-0 before junior Bella Saren scored before halftime to tie the game 1-1.
“Then I had a little heart-to-heart and told them it's time, we need to turn this around,” Halonen said about her halftime talk with her team. “Their second half was the best I've seen them play and we scored two more goals and dominated. Then we just continued that way through the weekend.”
Saren and junior Emily Mcvaugh scored in the second half of the Crested Butte game to give the Demons the 3-1 victory.
Against Fruita, senior Carter Neiman scored what Halonen called a “banger of a goal” in the first half with a free kick from about 30 yards away. The Demons took a 1-0 lead into halftime. In the second half, the game stopped because of a lightning and rain delay. The game never resumed because the officials deemed the field to be unplayable, according to Halonen. Because the teams played a half it could be counted as a game and a win for the Demons.
On Saturday, junior Emma Hyder and senior Reese Dahly each scored in the first half to give the Demons a 2-0 win over Grand Junction.
Durango’s defense has only allowed more than two goals twice this season. The first time was to 5A Cherry Creek in the opening game in a 3-0 loss and the second time was to Montrose in the Demons’ 2-1 loss in the fourth game of the season. Cherry Creek and Montrose have a combined record of 23-0-2.
Halonen said her defensive players are doing their jobs instead of trying to do too much. She also said she’s tweaked her formation in the midfield and Mcvaugh and Dahly are doing a great job at winning balls in the midfield.
Offensively, the Demons scored at least two goals in a game this weekend for the first time since their 8-0 win against Telluride on April 2.
“We're switching the point of attack through our defensive center midfielder versus through our back line,” Halonen said. “So we’re starting higher and we're a little bit more patient in knowing when to build and when to break when we're in our attacking half, versus as soon as we get into our attacking half, feeling like we have to score right away and then losing the ball.”
Halonen also said the girls are shooting more than earlier in the season which she approves of compared to not shooting at all.
The Demons had a goal at the beginning of the season to be a top-four seed in the 4A state tournament. Durango is in good position to achieve that goal.
Durango baseball drops two road games to Montrose
After three losses in a row, the Durango baseball team was not able to find its winning ways at Montrose and lost 6-3 on Friday and 16-3 on Saturday.
The Demons have now lost five games in a row and are 8-9 overall and 0-4 in the 4A/5A Southwestern League after the two losses. Montrose improved to 10-9 overall and 3-4 in the 4A/5A Southwestern League after the two wins.
In Friday’s game, Montrose got out to a 4-1 lead after the first inning. Durango made it 4-2 after two innings and Montrose led 6-2 after six innings. The Demons were only able to score a run in the seventh.
Durango outhit the Red Hawks 8-6 in defeat. Sophomores Austin Romero and Dawson McInnes each had two hits for the Demons. McInnes had an RBI and hit a home run.
Junior Jack Englund pitched for five innings and six strikeouts for the Demons. He allowed six runs and six hits. Junior Ro Rypkema pitched an inning and allowed a hit.
On Saturday, it was Durango that jumped out to a 3-0 lead after three innings. Then Montrose exploded 16 runs over the next three innings, including a 10-run sixth inning which ended the game.
Montrose outhit Durango 16-4. McInnes had a hit and two RBIs for the Demons. Romero pitched five innings and gave up eight hits, six runs and had six strikeouts. Senior Ian Szura also pitched and allowed eight runs and nine hits. Sophomore Ollie Peterson got on the mound as well for Durango and had a strikeout and gave up two hits and a run.
Durango has not scored more than three runs in a game in league play.
The Demons are back in action on Friday at home at 3 p.m. against Fruita Monument.
bkelly@durangoherald.com
