ARVADA — Levi Leisenring and Nik Levensteins each homered to help Ralston Valley baseball beat Pomona 13-2 on Saturday.
Leisenring also pitched five innings, allowing just two unearned runs on three hits. He didn’t walk a batter and struck out two.
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ENGLEWOOD — With the girls soccer season entering the final quarter of the 2015-16 campaign, it is vital teams play their best soccer coming down the stretch, as is the case in any sport.
And the CHSAANOW.com Class 3A No. 1-ranked Kent Denver Sun Devils answered such challenge again this week, as they put on a dominant performance versus Manual High School in a Metro League game, beating the Thunderbolts 10-0.
Even though Kent Denver played about as close to perfect a soccer match as humanly possible, coach Krista Sahrbeck believes her team can still find a way to get better.
“The idea is to be able to get everyone in to experience game situations, while trying to stick to our game-plan of ball movement, trying to play balls into space, anticipation and keeping our shape on defense,” Sahrbeck said. “These games allow us to go deep in our bench and so everybody can play and get that game experience knowing that you can never predict what might happen moving forward against good teams, so it’s good for us to get that experience.”
Sarhbeck’s players indeed made the most of their experience on the field as more than five players scored Friday, including sophomore Portia Tieze who capitalized on the opportunity to gain some experience Friday.
Being a younger player on the squad that prior to tonight played in only five games with one goal on the year, this was crucial not only for her growth as a player, but for her team’s growth as they prep for postseason play.
“With this game it’s important to learn how to play with a team, regardless of the situation, and that’s what we’ve been working on in every practice, every situation, and game including this one,” Tieze said. “No matter who is in the field or on the bench, we have to all play as a team because it’s not just the skillset, but the mentality of the whole.”
Now with only three more games remaining in the regular season for the Sun Devils, Sarhbeck isn’t just hopeful, but more so confident this is the year her team can get over the hump as they’ve been bounced in the semifinals the past three seasons.
“That’s a great question, more voodoo dolls, lucky rabbit’s feet, four-leaf clovers,” Sarhbeck joked. “But really for us, in a very fortunate way, I’d like to think that we’re very healthy, which last year hurt us big-time as we lost three girls to season-ending knee injuries.
“For us too, we are fortunate that our program is pretty deep and we don’t necessarily go down in skill when doing so that will help us, but again, it’s not always about the skill. The mental toughness, the heart, that’s stuff we work on as much as our skill.”
At the end of the day for Kent Denver, it’s about continuing the solid play and avoiding any drop in production as Sahrbeck and her team believe they have what it takes to handle business this postseason.
“We are trying to have positive momentum going into the end of the season,” Sahrbeck reiterated. We are just hoping to keep that momentum going for as long as we can with the idea of trying to play our best soccer in the postseason.”
COLORADO SPRINGS — Nine different players scored for Air Academy as they rolled past Pueblo West 17-3 Friday night.
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COLORADO SPRINGS — It took nearly a month and a half, but Air Academy finally won a boys lacrosse game at home.
It hasn’t been for lack of trying. Rather, the Kadets have simply played their best games on the road.
A 17-3 win over Pueblo West on Friday not only gave them their first win in front of their home fans, but it also gave them a huge confidence boost as they head into a showdown with the CHSAANow.com No. 3-ranked Indians from Cheyenne Mountain.
The Kadets (7-4 overall, 3-1 Class 4A Pikes Peak) currently sit at No. 7.
With any hopes of a league championship resting on what happens with the Indians, it was important for Air Academy to use Friday night’s game to show why they shouldn’t be taken lightly.
“It was really important to get our offense going out there,” midfielder August Scott said. “We have to get the little pieces together when we play a serious team like Cheyenne Mountain so I think it was good to get out here and get our offense in a concrete motion.”
Scott was one of two players to score three goals in the win over the Cyclones. Jake Thornally was the other. But it was Austin Konnath who led the scoring effort with four.
If there is one potential problem with offensive onslaught from the Kadets, it’s that goaltender Colt O’Connell did not get to see too many shots at his end of the field.
“Any time the ball is on the other side of the field, that’s a good thing,” O’Connell said. “It means our offense is producing and I can’t really hate on that.”
The last time that the Kadets and the Indians played, it was in the second round of the 4A playoffs last year. Cheyenne Mountain came away with a 11-9 win.
But that was a different Air Academy team. First-year coach John Mandico came in with the intention of completely changing the culture for the Kadets. Not only does he want his players to be successful on the field, but he wants them to be standup kids off the field as well.
They are to behave in a certain manner, which includes no profanity anywhere on the field.
“I think we can conduct ourselves where people will think that we are a classy bunch of guys,” he said.
On the field, he knows all about the importance of peaking at the right time and he feels that his team is on the upswing as they head into a game that will have a huge impact on the remainder of their season.
“It’s more about focusing and playing your game,” he said. “And if you look if the trend line, we’re peaking right now.”
They need to stay on that trend if they want to take down Cheyenne Mountain. The Indians have only lost one 4A game this year, and it was to No. 1-ranked Dawson School.
If the Kadet team that beat Pueblo West shows up on Wednesday, fans will be in for a treat when the whistle blows for that game.
HIGHLANDS RANCH — Chaparral girls soccer beat Highlands Ranch 2-1 on Friday. The Wolverines are now 5-3-0 this season.
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LITTLETON — Fourth-ranked Conifer boys lacrosse remained unbeaten with an 11-2 win over Golden on Friday. The Wolves are now 8-0.
With the loss, Golden drops to 10-2.
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LITTLETON — No. 8 Columbine boys lacrosse shut out Prairie View on Friday for a 13-0 win.
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DENVER — Claire Wright had five goals to help top-ranked Colorado Academy girls lacrosse beat Kent Denver 14-5 on Friday.
Bridget Sutter made seven saves for the Mustangs, while Lauren Russell had three goals and an assist.
The Mustangs are now 10-0 this season.
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LITTLETON — Matt Krattenmaker hit a two-run home run to help Ralston Valley baseball upset No. 6 Chatfield 4-2 on Friday.
Peter Carlson was also 2-for-4 with two RBIs, while Drake Davis allowed just two unearned runs in 4 2/3 innings of work on one hit. Davis struck out four.
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LAFAYETTE — If there was any question as to whether or not Dawson School is still the top boys lacrosse team in the state, it was answered on Thursday.
In an all out important conference game, the Class 4A CHSAANow No.1-ranked Mustangs rolled over No. 9 Thompson Valley, with a score of 18-6.
The Mustangs (9-1 overall, 4-0 Foothills) found the net 18 times with sophomore Gavyn Pure leading the way. Pure had six goals in the game, along with 3 assists.
“I thought our team played really well, we came out flying,” Pure said. “This has become a rival game over the past couple of years and this is obviously a fun one for us.”
It was an all around team effort for the Mustangs, as eight players scored thanks to complete dominance on the face-offs.
Junior Kyle Sudol lead the way for Dawson, taking every face-off of the game.
“I think it starts with the faceoffs. We won a lot of faceoffs today, so we managed the time of possession,” Dawson coach Peter Devlin.
Not only was Dawson’s offense clicking throughout the game but their defense was stellar, holding Thompson Valley (7-5, 2-2) to only one goal in the first half.
The Eagles had a hard time with their execution on offensive possessions and found themselves making lazy passes when trying to clear the ball.
“I thought early on was when we had some opportunities, we actually killed a couple of penalties,” Thompson Valley coach Will Cantwell said. “We had a couple decent possessions, we just couldn’t put the ball in the back of the net.”
The Mustangs came into this game with the motto of handwork and that’s just what they did throughout the game, especially in the third quarter.
“I was pleased, I thought we played hard and kind of stuck to our game plan and went on a roll,” Dawson coach Peter Devlin said.
Both teams came out tough in the third, with a total of ten goals being scored. Dawson knocked in seven goals, while Thompson Valley could only connect on three.
The Eagles never found their offensive momentum and weren’t able to catch up to the Mustangs.
“They’re the No. 1 team in 4A right now and we knew they were going to be really tough, I thought we played hard, I just hope we can learn from our mistakes,” Cantwell said.
Hunter Watts gave the Eagles defense a hard time in the third quarter when he was able to knock in four goals of his own.
And the fourth quarter was no different for Dawson, it kept its momentum throughout the whole game and continued to press the Eagles.
Dawson will look to kept the winning steak going and prove why it is the top team in 4A against Conifer on Apr. 27.
Thompson Valley will look to rebound from the loss when it takes on Battle Mountain on Apr. 25.