{"id":36819,"date":"2022-12-12T02:26:32","date_gmt":"2022-12-12T09:26:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/youthful-panthers-basketball-team-gains-valuable-experience\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:33:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:33:49","slug":"youthful-panthers-basketball-team-gains-valuable-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/youthful-panthers-basketball-team-gains-valuable-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"Youthful Panthers basketball team gains valuable experience"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Montezuma-Cortez\u2019s
Montezuma-Cortez\u2019s Savannah Haselroth brings the ball downcourt against Durango in this archived photo. (Journal file photo)<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

For a young basketball team, the first few weeks of the season can set the tone for the rest of the season.<\/p>\n

Playing in the rigorous Jerry Richardson Memorial Lady Chieftain Invitational in Shiprock, the Panthers girls basketball program showed the mettle of a team much wiser than their years.<\/p>\n

The Panthers rallied back from a heartbreaking loss against Pine Hill to pick up their first victory of the season \u2013 a 41-36 win over Whitehorse. The victory capped a 1-2 weekend, and taught fourth-year head coach Brad Wright that this year\u2019s group is already showing signs of resilience.<\/p>\n

M-CHS, coming off its best season in 10 years, lost a lot of scoring to graduation, which means the program will turn its leadership over to a junior-led group.<\/p>\n

\"Ignacio's
Ignacio's Harmony Reynolds puts up a difficult shot against Montezuma-Cortez's Markylla Jones in this archived photo. (Joel Priest\/Special to the Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cWe\u2019ve got a lot of people looking to establish chemistry out on the floor,\u201d said Wright, \u201cand with that chemistry, it\u2019s important for everyone to feel like they\u2019re part of what\u2019s going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thirteen Panthers saw the floor over the Shiprock event, with each player ready to step into a role to help the Panthers compete on each possession.<\/p>\n

Junior guard Savannah Haselroth possesses the most court time for the Panther returners, having played a prominent role ever since her first games as a freshman. Her 10 points in the victory over the Raiders led the way for the M-CHS offense, a day after she posted a career-high 16 against Pine Hill.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, classmate Markylla Jones also posted a pair of double-digit scoring performances over the weekend, including 14 against Pine Hill, as the junior steps up into a leadership role.<\/p>\n

\u201cMarkylla\u2019s been a lot more vocal,\u201d said Wright of his junior captain. \u201cShe\u2019s seeing the floor well and has really been working on building the other players up, even when we make mistakes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sophomore Taylor Whited emerged as the third-leading scorer from the three opening contests, averaging seven points per game over the span. A number of other sources, including the program\u2019s lone senior Amiyah Ogo, look to provide supplementary scoring, while providing a hallmark of Wright\u2019s program development \u2013 strong, tenacious defense.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re doing a lot of pass cutting, fast breaks and high pressure,\u201d added Wright. \u201cWe\u2019re a small team, so we know we\u2019re going to want to take advantage of our speed.\u201d<\/p>\n

After a 64-32 loss to Monument Valley, Utah, to open the season, Wright\u2019s team showed the capacity to bounce back, a quality that Wright knows is key to long-term success.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to emphasize how this is a game, and it should be fun,\u201d said the Panthers head coach, \u201cso we\u2019ve made that a cornerstone of the way we create a positive environment for the girls, and let that carry over to the way we play the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Juniors India Wright and Kayce Tom join a bevy of Panthers that can shoot from the perimeter, but the ability to balance the inside and outside game for M-CHS will prove to be important in a tough Intermountain League schedule ahead.<\/p>\n

A trip to Kirtland Central on Tuesday, Dec. 13, looms on the schedule, before a trip to Gunnison wraps up the 2022 portion of the schedule on Dec. 16-17. When the Panthers return from the break, league play gets underway, with Bayfield and Alamosa waiting on the docket for contests on Jan. 13-14.<\/p>\n

The Panthers finished just outside of the state tournament field of 32 a year ago, finishing 38th in the RPI rankings, and the hope is to keep striving to break into that next level. M-CHS look for their first playoff appearance since 2010, when the Panthers qualified in the 4A tournament field.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur future is really bright,\u201d said Wright, \u201cand we\u2019re looking to pick up right where we left off last year.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

M-CHS opens season with plenty of reason for optimism<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36820,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[600,28,36,29,346],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-36819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-basketball","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-cortez-high-school","tag-newsletter","tag-sports"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36819","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=36819"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36819\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83467,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36819\/revisions\/83467"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36819"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=36819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}