It wasn’t ideal weather for senior night for the Durango High School girls lacrosse team by any stretch. A storm rolled in just in time for the first face-off, but that did not dampen the Demons’ offense, as they cruised to a 15-4 win over Telluride on Monday night at DHS.
In the first half, senior attack Kiara Valley opened the scoring with a goal that she bounced in to give Durango a 1-0 lead with just 59 seconds off the game clock.
The Demons (6-6, 5-3 Mountain League) would go on to score the next six goals to take a 7-0 lead midway through the first half.
Telluride (1-7, 1-7 ML) got on the scoreboard with 1:58 left in the half with a goal from Sierra Shambaugh to make it 7-1. The teams exchanged goals after that, and the Demons went into halftime with an 8-2 lead.
“We played five games in four days, but even heading into our warm-ups, we looked really fresh, and it was an awesome way to bounce back,” said DHS head coach Natalie Mitchell. “In the first half, it was so fun to get everybody involved, and they all have a chance to score, and we’re just a big threat because we have a lot of weapons.”
In the second half, Valley continued to assert her dominance and scored three more times. With a total of five goals and an assist, she finished with six points.
Telluride would get within six goals after the Miners scored back to back in the opening five minutes of the second half. Durango’s defense shook off their tired legs, after they played three games in a 24-hour span over the weekend, and shut down THS for the rest of the game, as the Miners would finish with the four goals.
“We re-visited some of those key defensive tactics over the last couple of weeks, and it’s just really clicked for us,” Mitchell said. “We are playing great on both sides of the ball, and I think we can continue it on Friday.”
Jazelyn Martinez, Paige Ammerman and Autumn Rymerson each scored twice for the Demons, while Rachel Moranty and Tori Raybourn also scored.
DHS goalie Virginia Herr finished with nine saves, including four in the second half, and the Demons went 11 of 16 in draw controls.
Durango will close its season when it hosts Fruita Monument (8-4, 7-2 ML) at 4 p.m. Friday.
bploen@durangoherald.com
