{"id":16798,"date":"2025-08-24T16:10:17","date_gmt":"2025-08-24T16:10:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/relentless-attack-lifts-montezuma-cortez-soccer-in-home-opener\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T04:01:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:01:22","slug":"relentless-attack-lifts-montezuma-cortez-soccer-in-home-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/relentless-attack-lifts-montezuma-cortez-soccer-in-home-opener\/","title":{"rendered":"Relentless attack lifts Montezuma-Cortez soccer in home opener"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Montezuma-Cortez
Montezuma-Cortez sophomore Brandon Zamora looks to drive past a Ridgway defender in a match against the Demons in Cortez. Erika Alvero\/Special to The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

CORTEZ \u2013 The result was worth the wait.<\/p>\n

Not just the nearly three-hour weather delay that postponed kickoff Friday night, but the end of a seven-year winless streak against Ridgway. Montezuma-Cortez High School\u2019s boys soccer team finally broke through, defeating the Demons 4-2 in their home opener.<\/p>\n

The Panthers controlled possession throughout their first home match of the season, improving to 1-1 under fourth-year head coach Juan Soto. He hopes the win will build momentum and boost team confidence.<\/p>\n

Sophomores Brandon Zamora-Ruiz and Chase York scored back-to-back goals in the first half to give M-CHS an early edge. Ridgway responded before halftime to cut the lead to 2-1.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight after the first goal, you could see the confidence building up,\u201d Soto said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s when we got the second one.\u201d<\/p>\n

Freshman Landon Yarbrough netted his first high school goal early in the second half to restore the two-goal cushion. Ridgway answered again, but Zamora-Ruiz sealed the win with a late goal off a well-placed cross.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe kids communicated well, played their positions, made great wall passes \u2013 they love playing that style,\u201d Soto said.<\/p>\n

Coming off a 3-0 loss to Bloomfield, the Panthers showed resilience that encourages Soto ahead of three more nonleague games in the next two weeks.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cThis group has a hunger to win,\u201d Soto said. \u201cAnd that led us to be more aggressive, but also more coordinated.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sophomore goalkeeper Gael Fernandez made several key saves to keep Ridgway at bay, earning praise from Soto.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s vocal, tells his defense where he wants them to be \u2013 and he attacks the ball,\u201d Soto said.<\/p>\n

Soto also highlighted the leadership emerging among the Class of \u201928, which anchors the midfield and attack.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve played together for so many years and have been communicating both on and off the field,\u201d he said. \u201cSo when they get the ball, they know exactly where to put it to find their teammates.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Panthers continue their four-match homestand Saturday, Aug. 30, against Eagle Valley at 11 a.m. They\u2019ll face Telluride on Sept. 5 and Moffat County on Sept. 6 before opening Intermountain League play on the road against defending champion Pagosa Springs on Sept. 9.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

M-CHS downs Ridgway for the first time since 2018<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16462,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[38,39,28,37,36],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-16798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-dolores-high-school","tag-dove-creek-high-school","tag-headlines","tag-mancos-high-school","tag-montezuma-cortez-high-school"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16798"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16798\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20809,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16798\/revisions\/20809"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16798"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=16798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}