Last season was a tough ending for the Durango hockey team. The Demons faced Cheyenne Mountain in the 4A state playoffs and lost 5-0.

This season, Durango flipped the script and dominated Cheyenne Mountain 6-1 inside Chapman Hill Ice Rink Tuesday night.

“The kids have been working hard all season to get better and getting used to each other,” Durango head coach Brian Ensign said. “They came out with tons of energy, they withstood some good pressure in the beginning on Cheyenne’s part and we had good offensive production from a lot of kids. Our top line came to play and they produced.”

Durango improved to 12-6 overall with the win and Cheyenne Mountain fell to 12-6-1 after the loss.

The Demons will move on to face the winner of top seed Glenwood Springs and the eighth seed Battle Mountain on Saturday at the South Suburban Sports Complex in Highlands Ranch.

Senior forward Henry Howe had two goals and two assists to lead Durango. Senior forward Brady Holbrook had a goal and three assists while sophomore defenseman Leyton Holbrook had two goals. Sophomore forward Wynn Daniels had a goal and senior forward Loudon Doemland and junior forward Bryson Quimby each had an assist as well.

“That line, they’re all seniors and they’re all highly skilled players,” Ensign said about his first line. “They are all pretty independent players and getting them to work together throughout the season has been a process. But they’re starting to trust each other and talk to each other … It’s obviously working for them. They weren’t producing at the beginning of the year but they were playing well. Now they’re producing.”

Luke Depeppe scored the lone goal for the Red-Tailed Hawks which was assisted by Tyler Kriss.

Durango killed a key power play with less than three minutes to go in the first period and then went on a power play of its own.

Leyton Holbrook hit a slap shot with 1:29 left in the first period for a 1-0 lead for the Demons.

Durango continued to pressure Cheyenne Mountain with possession in Cheyenne Mountain’s own zone until the buzzer sounded to end the first period.

Durango goaltender Luka Remec really had to stretch out for a few saves to start the second period. The Demons had a good chance with 11:15 left but the shot was pushed away after Durango had solid possession for a minute or so.

Brady Holbrook scored a beautiful goal off a counterattack where he got the puck on the left hand side and shot just inside the blue line with 8:45 left in the second period to put the Demons up 2-0.

Durango went down a man for two minutes for tripping with less than seven minutes left but the Demons scored a man down by Brady Holbrook from his brother with 6:38 to go to put the Demons up 3-0.

The defense did a great job of killing the penalty and Remec didn’t have any difficult saves to make to keep the clean sheet.

Unfortunately, the Demons picked up another penalty right at the end of the last penalty because of a cross-check. Durango couldn’t play a clean game at the end of the second period and went two men down with a tripping call with 3:15 left to go.

Durango did a stellar job of killing both penalties and took a 3-0 lead into the third period.

“We want to be disciplined and we don’t want to get in that situation,” Ensign said. “Hockey is a game where you’re going to get some penalties. We work on our kill a lot. We had a lot of energy on our kill as well as on our five-on-five. We saw them struggling to connect passes and we put a lot of pressure on them.”

Cheyenne Mountain came out aggressive and possessed the puck in the Demons zone but it couldn’t get a great look on target.

Durango countered with some puck possession of its own and that culminated in a bar-down rip by Daniels with 13:02 left to put the Demons up 4-0.

Remec made a great save with the puck and numerous bodies in front of the goal in a scrum.

With 10:30 left in the game, Cheyenne Mountain pulled its goalie to get another man on the ice to attack.

This paid off as Depeppe for Cheyenne Mountain put an easy finish in the back of the net with 9:07 left to make it 4-1.

Durango had a chance to extend the lead once again with a two-minute power play and it capitalized immediately with a goal by Howe from Brady Holbrook with 7:31 left to push the lead to 5-1.

Howe added another goal with a shot at the center red line with the goalie pulled to put the Demons up 6-1 with less than three minutes left.

bkelly@durangoherald.com