{"id":68886,"date":"2016-09-28T23:05:36","date_gmt":"2016-09-29T05:05:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/surprise-kicker-elena-cosner\/"},"modified":"2016-09-29T05:05:36","modified_gmt":"2016-09-29T05:05:36","slug":"surprise-kicker-elena-cosner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/surprise-kicker-elena-cosner\/","title":{"rendered":"Surprise kicker Elena Cosner"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Elena
Elena Cosner kicks an extra point for the Bears during their homecoming win last Friday night.<\/span>Sam Green\/The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

With two daughters, Holly Cosner never thought she would be a football mom.<\/p>\n

But she and husband Charles got a surprise this fall when their eldest daughter Elena decided to try out for the Dolores High School football team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was all about it,\u201d said Holly. \u201cI\u2019ve told my kids that they can do whatever they want. That\u2019s what my parents told me, so I couldn\u2019t say no.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe told me she was going to go out on Monday and tryout,\u201d explained Charles. \u201cAnd then she said, \u2018Dad, I get my jersey on Wednesday.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cosner, a sophomore at Dolores, said she\u2019s played soccer since she was three. So when she was watching a Dolores football practice at the beginning of the season and began chatting with head coach Chris Trusler, the subject of kicking arose.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnytime I see a soccer player, we say \u2018Hey, come out and kick,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cIf they\u2019ve been doing it for many, many years, well let\u2019s transition them into a kicker for the football program.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trusler and the Dolores coaching staff have been working with Cosner on making that transition. And she\u2019s also putting in time with long-time Dove Creek coach and Colorado Coaches Hall of Famer Ken Soper.<\/p>\n

Cosner\u2019s first point after attempt came up short in the Bears\u2019 24-14 win over Shiprock earlier this season. And she didn\u2019t get the chance to kick on her second attempt after a botched snap \u2013 although the Bears were able to turn the play into a successful 2-point conversion.<\/p>\n

But last Friday during the Bears\u2019 homecoming \u2013 in which Cosner was part of the royalty \u2013 she put two PATs through the uprights and finished 2 for 4.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was on cloud nine,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was crazy, it just went in so perfect. I just imagined it in my head and it worked.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cosner has become a fan favorite when she trots out in her number 18 jersey to kick after a Bears\u2019 touchdown. But she said she was unaware of the celebration in the bleachers after making her first PAT on homecoming night.<\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t hear anyone because I was screaming myself,\u201d she said laughing.<\/p>\n

Charles and Holly have gotten to watch their daughter Elena and the Dolores Bears get off to a 3-1 record to start the season. And Elena intends to play football for the Bears for her junior and season seasons as well.<\/p>\n

Elena will graduate in 2019, but with sister Olivia showing interest in football, perhaps Charles and Holly will be rooting for another family football player in the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe thinks it\u2019s pretty cool, so she says she\u2019d like to kick,\u201d Holly said smiling. \u201cBut she\u2019s in seventh grade \u2013 so we\u2019ll just focus on Elena right now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dolores sophomore Elena Cosner uses soccer skills on the football field<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":68887,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[44],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-68886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-dolores"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68886","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=68886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68886"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=68886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}