<\/p>\n
Thirteen minutes into its home game against Rangely on Aug. 31, the Dove Creek High School football team trailed 14-6 and appeared poised to compete for a victory. Twelve difficult minutes later, the Bulldogs trailed 51-6, and hopes of winning were all but lost.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were playing right with them, and then we kind of got sloppy, and we weren\u2019t disciplined with our emotions,\u201d Dove Creek head coach Shane Baughman said. \u201cIf we learn one thing from this game, it\u2019s that we can\u2019t let our emotions take over.\u201d<\/p>\n
The game began on a positive note for the home team, and its fans as Dove Creek\u2019s defense stood tall on the game\u2019s opening possession and forced Rangely to punt. On Rangely\u2019s second offensive possession of the game, Austin Green recovered a fumble, much to the chagrin of teammates and fans.<\/p>\n
Although Rangely\u2019s offense started to catch fire late in the first quarter and scored twice to pull ahead 14-0, Dove Creek refused to yield and cut the gap to 14-6 with 11:50 left in the second quarter when Gauge Thompson scored a 31-yard rushing touchdown.<\/p>\n
Rangely outscored Dove Creek 37-0 over the next 11 minutes, however, and as Dove Creek players headed toward their end zone at halftime, trailing 51-6, shoulders were hunched, and players appeared shell-shocked.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe played more as a team last week, and we didn\u2019t drop our heads as much,\u201d said Dove Creek\u2019s freshman quarterback, Chorbine Cressler. \u201cI definitely learned a lot from this game. I can act more as a team leader and not let things make me mad as easily.\u201d<\/p>\n
After Dove Creek\u2019s coaching staff delivered a stern lecture during the halftime break, Bulldogs players returned to the field and played far better and outscored Rangely 12-6 during the second half.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope that (our players) got our message that we weren\u2019t very happy with them at halftime,\u201d Baughman said. \u201cThey cleaned up their emotions in the second half, and that was the difference.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among the second-half highlights for Dove Creek was a 55-yard touchdown and a 60-yard touchdown run by Cressler, who showed off fancy footwork on both plays and evaded numerous Rangely defenders.<\/p>\n
Dove Creek\u2019s offensive line, led by JD Dennison, Hayden Grey and Austin Green, also played well throughout the second half while opening numerous running lanes for Cressler and his teammates.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just love to run the ball, even though I\u2019m quarterback,\u201d Cressler said. \u201cI love to make cuts and make people look bad on the field.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now 1-1 on the season, Dove Creek will return to the practice field to prepare for a road matchup against Plateau Valley on Sept. 8.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know nothing about Plateau Valley,\u201d Baughman said. \u201cThey are always different every year. They sometimes get unbelievable athletes from as far away as New York City, so we\u2019ll have to be ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Chorbine Cressler shines, but poor second quarter dooms Bulldogs during 57-18 defeat<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":98176,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5770],"tags":[80,346],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-98175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-high-school-sports","tag-dove-creek","tag-sports"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98175","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=98175"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98175\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98175"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=98175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}