{"id":23409,"date":"2025-02-23T20:12:50","date_gmt":"2025-02-24T03:12:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wild-hoops-weekend-sets-up-pivotal-finales\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:35:28","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:35:28","slug":"wild-hoops-weekend-sets-up-pivotal-finales","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wild-hoops-weekend-sets-up-pivotal-finales\/","title":{"rendered":"Wild hoops weekend sets up pivotal finales"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Montezuma-Cortez
Montezuma-Cortez junior Trey Hall (3) looks to lead the Panthers as the season gets underway. (Joel Priest\/Special to The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

As the marathon of the 2024-25 regular season nears its conclusion, excitement and exhaustion was on full display Friday night with big comebacks helping to set the stage for the finishing sprint.<\/p>\n

Boys: M-CHS 60, Monte Vista 57<\/div>\n

Montezuma-Cortez led by a 30-24 margin at halftime, and appeared to have control of the tempo against the Pirates. However, a sizable Monte Vista run in the third quarter put the Panthers down by nine heading to the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n

The visitors answered the bell, however, and stormed all the way back with a huge final stanza, escaping a Monte Vista buzzer-beating attempt to tie. Recent wins have buoyed the Panthers (17-5, 9-2 IML) to No. 11 in the 4A rankings in the CHSAA Seeding, and M-CHS will look to close out the regular season with momentum as they travel to Bayfield on Friday night.<\/p>\n

Girls: Monte Vista 46, M-CHS 37<\/div>\n

The Panthers looked down and out after the host Pirates built a 15-point halftime lead and led by more than 20 in the final period. However, a frenetic rally by the Panthers pulled them within eight in the closing stages, only to run out of time to complete the comeback.<\/p>\n

The loss leaves the Panthers (6-16, 2-9 IML) in the 33rd spot in the CHSAA Seeding and Selection Index after the weekend\u2019s action, meaning that their regular season finale against Bayfield on Friday night is a must-win for Brad Wright\u2019s squad.<\/p>\n

Boys: Ouray 52, Dove Creek 49<\/div>\n

The Bulldogs trailed for virtually the entire way against their former 1A district nemesis, and even a 23-point fourth quarter wasn\u2019t enough to complete the rally from a double-digit deficit. Dove Creek (16-6, 10-1 SJBL) suffered their first defeat in their last 13 outings, and the loss sets up a winner-take-all contest against Ridgway on Thursday for the outright San Juan Basin title.<\/p>\n

The Bulldogs fell a few notches in the 2A rankings as well, sliding to No. 17 in the CHSAA Seeding.<\/p>\n

For the DC girls, Ouray did not field a team for their contest, so they will look to close out the regular season with a trip to Ridgway, as well. The Bulldogs (16-5, 8-2 SJBL) currently sit No. 16 in the 2A field in the CHSAA Seeding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

boys will play for SJBL title, M-CHS girls vying for postseason<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22876,"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-23409","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\/23409","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=23409"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23409\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78106,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23409\/revisions\/78106"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23409"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=23409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}