{"id":37447,"date":"2022-11-06T23:30:21","date_gmt":"2022-11-07T06:30:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dove-creek-controls-west-grand-to-open-playoff-run\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:37:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:37:18","slug":"dove-creek-controls-west-grand-to-open-playoff-run","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dove-creek-controls-west-grand-to-open-playoff-run\/","title":{"rendered":"Dove Creek controls West Grand to open playoff run"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=c8a91393-3efa-5b7c-b650-1582b094297f&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1323\" alt=\"Gage Buffington leaps over a tackler on the way to a big gain for Dove Creek.(Sam Green\/Special to The Journal)\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">Gage Buffington leaps over a tackler on the way to a big gain for Dove Creek.(Sam Green\/Special to The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n<p>Facing the opposite sideline from the winningest coach in Colorado high school history, Dove Creek head coach Shane Baughman knew that his team would face a well-prepared Mustangs squad in the eight-man postseason opener.<\/p>\n<p>West Grand, coached by preps coach legend Chris Brown, couldn\u2019t prepare for the team speed of the Bulldogs.<\/p>\n<p>The \u2019Dogs jumped on the Mustangs from the opening kickoff and never let up, picking up their 10th win of the season in a 52-18 opening-round victory.<\/p>\n<p>Junior running back Gage Buffington scored three touchdowns, including two short scores in the opening quarter, to help the Bulldogs (10-0) jump out in front 18-0 after 12 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>From there, the Bulldogs defense turned up the noise, scoring twice with safeties in the first half, as Creek took to the locker room up 28-6.<\/p>\n<p>Seniors Kendall Gardner, Kade Hankins and Taber Dejane all found the end zone in the second half, headlined by Dejane\u2019s kick return for a score, meaning the Bulldogs scored in all three phases of the game.<\/p>\n<p>The No. 15 Mustangs (7-3) countered with a couple of late scores, but Dove Creek had already punched their ticket to a quarterfinal date with No. 10 Merino, which knocked out No. 7 Crowley County in the opening round.<\/p>\n<p>The Bulldogs and Rams will meet with a spot in the semifinals on the line next week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bulldogs jump out to 18-0 lead in first 12 minutes<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32312,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29,346],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-37447","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter","tag-sports"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37447","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=37447"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37447\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83662,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37447\/revisions\/83662"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37447"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=37447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}