The Montezuma-Cortez soccer team dropped contests to both the Ridgway Demons and Telluride Miners at home earlier this season.
But last weekend, with the season winding down, the Panthers caught fire to come away with road victories over both.
On Friday, senior Manuel Martinez led M-CHS over the Demons with a four-goal performance.
Martinez scored twice in the first half, and Juan Para added another goal for the Panthers, who led 3-1 at the break.
Ridgway scored three times in the second half, but Martinez found the net twice more to push the Panthers on to a 5-4 win.
Jesus Ruiz finished with two assists and Skyler Yarbrough, Alden Adams and Para each had one.
Defensively, head coach Sean Fitzgerald mixed things up at the goalkeeper position.
Davian Robinson played 45 minutes in goal and came up with four saves while allowing two scores, and then Tyler Cutrone played 10 minutes allowing one goal.
Yarbrough finished in the net for M-CHS, playing 25 minutes and tallying three saves while allowing one score.
“Skyler did really well,” said Fitzgerald. “So he stayed goalie on Saturday as well and he stepped it up big time for the team.”
The Miners had thumped the Panthers 8-0 earlier in the season in Cortez. But on Saturday, Yarbrough came up with 14 saves and Martinez finished with a hat trick to lead the Panthers to a 3-2 win.
It was not only a bit of revenge from their previous loss, but the Panthers got the last laugh by ruining Telluride’s chance to make the playoffs and spoiling the Miners’ opening ceremony at their brand new field, winning both the varsity and junior varsity matches.
“It was one heck of a weekend for us,” said Fitzgerald. “Because kind of what we thought we were going to do in the beginning of the season is what we’ve done in the last two games.”
M-CHS is now 3-10 on the year and 2-9 in Intermountain League play. The Panthers will finish out the season on Tuesday in Pagosa Springs (4-8-2, 4-5-2 IML).
