{"id":48808,"date":"2021-02-04T20:37:04","date_gmt":"2021-02-05T03:37:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-lady-jays-race-past-telluride\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:44:57","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:44:57","slug":"mancos-lady-jays-race-past-telluride","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-lady-jays-race-past-telluride\/","title":{"rendered":"Mancos Lady Jays race past Telluride"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Mancos
Mancos senior Lizzy Mee reacts as Telluride senior Melena Krownapple rises to shoot a jump shot during Tuesday night\u2019s game.<\/span>Erika Alvero\/For The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

As an eighth grader last season, Mancos High School freshman Quincy Montoya watched from the sideline while dreaming of one day transforming the Lady Jays offense into a high-flying, fast-paced machine.<\/p>\n

Now a year removed from her final year of middle school, freshman\u2019s dream continues appears to be being realized as evidenced by her team\u2019s stellar performance during its 41-15 home victory over Telluride on Feb. 2.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like we just bring another intensity level,\u201d said Montoya, who scored 16 points in just her third high school game. \u201cLast year, the team didn\u2019t have as much speed and height, and I think that our freshmen have really helped with that this year.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Mancos
Mancos freshman Quincy Montoya crashes into a Telluride defender and a Mancos teammate during Tuesday night&#x2019;s game.<\/span>Erika Alvero\/For The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

In addition to receiving a boost from Montoya and fellow freshman Teya Yeomans, who scored five points and pulled down several rebounds, the Lady Jays benefited from the play of junior point guard Rhiley Montoya, who scored 11 points and came through with numerous steals.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomething that we\u2019ll be able to carry throughout the season is our speed and our defense,\u201d Rhiley Montoya said. \u201cMy mom, (head coach Kerri Morgan), always says, \u2018Play hard until they start calling fouls.\u2019 If they start calling stuff, then we back off a little bit, but you can never have too hard a defense.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Mancos
Mancos senior Lizzy Mee reacts as Telluride senior Melena Krownapple rises to shoot a jump shot during Tuesday night&#x2019;s game.<\/span>Erika Alvero\/For The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Although the ultimate result of the contest against the Miners was a lopsided win, the opening quarter of the contest was a back-and-forth struggle that featured both teams missing easy shots in the paint and turning the ball over.<\/p>\n

After a layup by Yeomans just before the end of the opening quarter gave the Lady Jays an 8-4 lead, Mancos yielded a basket to Telluride senior Kyra Levan before outscoring the Miners 12-0 during the remainder of the second quarter and carrying a 20-6 lead into halftime.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last few years, we\u2019ve struggled with getting the ball up the floor,\u201d said Rhiley Montoya, when asked about her team\u2019s second-quarter run. \u201cNow that we have a little bit of speed with our freshmen, it\u2019s a lot easier to get the ball up the floor. The faster you get the ball up the floor, the less time the defense has to set up.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Erika
Erika Alvero\/For The Journal<br><br>Mancos senior Tia Imel races ahead of the defense for a breakaway layup during the second half of her team&#x2019;s victory over Telluride.<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

As the second half got underway, Mancos\u2019 defense continued to create turnovers while the Lady Jays did a nice job of patiently executing their offense and setting one another up for easy baskets from all areas of the floor.<\/p>\n

Among the most effective Mancos players offensively was Quincy Montoya, whose step-through layup after a nice drive to the basket gave Mancos a 29-11 lead. The freshman followed up with a 3-pointer from the left baseline later in the corner to put the Lady Jays ahead 34-11 heading into the final quarter of play.<\/p>\n

\"Mancos
Mancos senior Lizzy Mee reacts as Telluride senior Melena Krownapple rises to shoot a jump shot during Tuesday night&#x2019;s game.<\/span>Erika Alvero\/For The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

With the game completely in hand during the final 8 minutes, the Lady Jays iced their victory by pounding the ball into Yeomans on the low block and allowing Rhiley Montoya to race around the perimeter and knock down long shots from the outside.<\/p>\n

Complimenting Quincy Montoya\u2019s 16 points and Rhiley Montoya\u2019s 11 points were Yeomans and senior Madi Hale, who each scored five points in the contest. Telluride was led offensively by Lovely and Morgan Watkinson, who scored four points each.<\/p>\n

\"Mancos
Mancos senior Tia Imel plays tough defense against Telluride&#x2019;s Margaux Lovely.<\/span>Erika Alvero\/For The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Now 2-1 on the season and brimming with confidence, Mancos will return to the practice court to prepare for a home matchup against Ouray on Feb. 6.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to limit our turnovers and run our offense consistently, said Rhiley Montoya, when asked how her team can still improve. \u201cOur offense needs to be more consistent and run properly if we want to make it to state.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Freshman Quincy Montoya scores career-high 16 points<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48809,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[37,29,346],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-48808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-mancos-high-school","tag-newsletter","tag-sports"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48808","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=48808"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87464,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48808\/revisions\/87464"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48808"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=48808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}