Manitou girls basketball team taking advantage of winnable games
With some tough league games ahead, the Manitou Springs girls basketball team is taking advantage of a stretch where it can stack up wins to build a postseason resumé.
A 39-23 win at La Junta on Feb. 1 gave the Mustangs their fifth straight win in a row and as of Tuesday, they sat at No. 28 in the Class 4A CHSAA Selection and Seeding Index. The top 32 teams in the Index make the postseason, so the Mustangs (8-6 overall, 5-1 Tri-Peaks) need to keep taking advantage of winnable games to try and strengthen their foothold.
“We’re going to be in a tougher stretch of our league games here at the end of the season than we were at the beginning,” coach Gabby Santos said. “Taking things one game at a time is not a perspective we can have right now. We need to focus on how we’re doing as a team, less so on how we’re adapting to the teams that we’re playing, but show up to the best of our ability every day and make sure that our best is better than the day before.”
Road games to places like La Junta can be tough because of the long travel and then a bit of a wait as sub-varsity games are being played out. But the Mustangs started hot in their win over the Tigers. Kate Jorstad was on fire from 3-point range, going 5-for-7 on her way to scoring a game-high 18 points.
Aylin Gomez’s offensive momentum continued as she knocked down a pair of 3-pointers and scored nine points. The Mustangs overall shot 41% from long range, one of their best shooting days on the year.
Knowing they need to keep stacking wins as long as they can, the Mustangs picked a good time to see their shooting percentage increase.
“Being on this streak right now, we’ve moved further up into the playoff [seeding],” Jorstad said. “Being able to win against these teams is going to help develop and get better for when we see tough teams like CSCS.”
The Mustangs hosted Colorado Springs Christian on Wednesday, but the results were not available at press time.
The biggest encouragement for this team across the board is that multiple players are stepping up to contribute and there’s no relying on a single player to generate offense or come up with a big rebound or steal.
The Mustangs are truly winning on a team effort which was always the best avenue to get into the postseason.
“January has been good for us to see how we’re growing against these teams,” Santos said. “We’ve won games that we needed to win and there are a couple more that we need to be competitive in and a couple more that take out from under teams.”
The Mustangs are on the road against Woodland Park and Salida next week before returning home to face Lamar.
Mustangs grab momentum as they head toward wrestling regionals
The months of work and training will come to a head this week for the Manitou Springs wrestling teams as the postseason is upon them.
After battling through invites last weekend that also served as league championship tournaments, the Mustangs head to regionals this weekend where they’ll try to qualify for next week’s state tournament at Ball Arena in Denver.
Kara Donegan and Abbie Reeves are league champions based on the results of the tournament in Walsenburg. Hannah Rickert and Alex Traenkle are all-league honorable mention. Traenkle, Donegan and Reeves all reached the podium in Walsenburg, a nice momentum boost for what’s ahead of them this week.
“It was the competition that I wanted to see and the wrestlers that we will see at state and even some of them at regionals,” Traenkle said. “It was nice to see them compete and to get back into it after being sick.”
It was the competition that I wanted to see. Alex Traenkle
The majority of the Mustangs caught a bit of a bug over the last two weeks but appear to be trending toward healthy for regionals.
Traenkle had a fell in her first match at 120 pounds but won three straight after that to reach the third-place match. She lost there to Walsenburg’s Eruka Peterson by a 15-2 major decision. Peterson was the wrestler who had beaten Traenkle earlier in the tournament.
Donegan and Reeves each made it to the championship match of their respective brackets and came away with different results.
Donegan ran into a buzzsaw in Gunnison’s Roxie Uhrig who scored a second-period pin. Donegan finished in second place but is optimistic about what she can do at regionals.
Reeves scored three pins and a 16-1 tech fall en route to winning the 145-pund title.
Hannah Rickert lost two of her first three matches but her win over Lamar’s Alexa Ridder is another step in her development, just like the regional tournament will be this weekend.
She’s in the same boat as some of the boys wrestlers as this will be a crucial weekend in gaining experience and getting setup for future success.
“They need the mat time,” coach Paul Bonner said. “I just showed [previous records] to some of the freshmen, and they were surprised. They need to understand that consistency, being at practice and putting in time on the mat is beneficial.”
The previous records were from the winter of 2022 when Donegan and Reeves were freshmen. They lost more matches than they won. But after working and improving over the last three years, they’re in a position to make it to state and perform well on the biggest stage of the year.
Mustangs basketball team win at La Junta
Without hesitation, Manitou Springs boys basketball coach Nick Nunley admits that he’d rather see his team come away with a sloppy win than take a loss, but have it feel like a moral victory.
He’s been in a position this year where he has experienced both. The Mustangs may have played their best game of the year in a loss to Banning Lewis a few weeks ago and on Feb. 1 they were on the road against La Junta and got a 58-50 win in a game that was much closer than it should have been.
But perhaps it’s an encouraging sign that the Mustangs (10-4 overall, 4-2 Tri-Peaks) can battle to a win even without playing their best basketball.
“Those guys didn’t waver for a second,” Nunley said. “They took coaching really well and they weren’t going to leave there without a win. I’ll take it.”
La Junta played a more physical style of basketball than what the Mustangs have seen this year. Forced to respond, Cohen Barrett was called for two quick fouls and had to head to the bench, meaning the bulk of the scoring had to come from elsewhere.
Ashur Lavigne and Tommy Reed were more than happy to accept that challenge. Lavigne caught fire from 3-point range, going 5-for-8. He scored a team-high and is now scoring nearly 11 points per game. Reed did the bulk of his work from inside the arc but ended with 15 points while grabbing seven rebounds and dishing out three assists.
The Tigers were happy to give the Mustangs a physical test, but even if they didn’t play their best, they felt they passed it and can use it a lesson moving forward.
“We know what it means to have to be tough and to work hard when we’re on the floor,” senior guard Jon Polizzi said. “Being in a real situation like that where the other team is going to push you to be aggressive, having that game experience now sets us up better for the future.”
The Mustangs still have some tough league games ahead of them with Salida and Vanguard still on the slate, but this team has shown signs of rallying around each other and staring down a goal of making the playoffs. That was evident when Nunley walked into the locker room after the La Junta win discouraged with the team’s play. But he never had to say a word.
“Before I got into that locker room, my captains were on it,” Nunley said. “Cohen and Preston [Rhodes] told those guys that this wasn’t our best basketball. Without me having to say anything, they got the message.”
The Mustangs hit the road a bit next week as they travel to Woodland Park and Salida. They return to Manitou on Saturday when they host Lamar.
Manitou swimmers ready to compete at state
Not having a genuine senior on the roster makes the upcoming Class 3A girls swimming and diving state meet a crucial one for Manitou Springs High School.
The Mustangs competed at the Tri-Peaks league meet over the weekend, getting their last bit of competition in before preparing for their trip to the Veterans Memorial Aquatic Center in Thornton.
Story Aldridge added another event to her docket at state as she took ninth in the 200-yard individual medley with a time of 2 minutes, 33.74 seconds to make the state cut. She has additionally qualified for the 50 freestyle, 100 breaststroke and 100 freestyle. She’ll also compete in all three relay races for the Mustangs.
The competition is good as getting experience at the VMAC will go a long way in the Mustangs making improvements over the next year or two. That’s been a huge goal for the Mustangs this season.
“We wanted to try and build a little more excitement and showcase that higher level of swimming that we’re trying to work towards,” coach Whitney Nuci said. “As a team, we want to go in and give everything we have.”
The big meets have helped us as bond as a team and mentally strengthen us. Savannah Bartko
The Mustangs finished 25th of 31 teams at state last year, scoring 41 total points. Scoring above that this year would be a big accomplishment for the team, especially when factoring in that any experience next week will only make the Mustangs better for future years. They’ve gotten a taste of high-level competition throughout the year, such as the Pueblo County Hornet Invite, so this is just the next step in the team’s development.
“The big meets have helped us as bond as a team and mentally strengthen us,” junior Savannah Bartko said. “It’s hard competition and sometimes you don’t win and sometimes you lose by a lot, but that also helps build mental strength and push us to get those wins.”
Bartko will be on the state roster as a member of the relay teams. Nuci said there are still some decisions to be made based on some times that she saw at the league meet.
But the Mustangs have spent the week getting prepared and feel that they’ll be ready to perform their best when the 3A swim prelims begin on Monday.
On Tuesday, Rhys Parratt will compete in the diving championship and according to the psych sheets released by CHSAA on Monday, she is seeded 10th heading into the event. Should the Mustangs make it to the swim finals, those will begin at 5:15 p.m. on Tuesday.
