Longmont – The two greatest concerns for Silver Creek and soccer coach Sarah Friend on Saturday were prom and the sprinklers that inadvertently came on and soaked the team during the halftime meeting.
Further down that list might have been worrying about the Raptors’ second-round foe in the Class 4A state tournament.
Silver Creek cruised into the quarterfinals with a 7-0 rout of Montrose and will play the Battle Mountain- Golden winner on its home field Thursday.
“The last two years it’s been the same story: We’ve kind of had an easy go the first two rounds,” said Friend, whose Raptors dispatched Woodland Park 10-0 in the first round. “But then we always seem to run into a brick wall in the quarterfinals, so we are not taking any of this for granted.”
Montrose, which pulled off a 2-1 first-round upset of Pueblo Centennial, was on its heels from the get-go.
The 19th-seeded Indians (11-4-2) finally broke in the 13th minute when Marinne Burnham turned the corner past two defenders, squared and slid a shot past goalie Elizabeth Beshoar.
That was the first of three goals in a six-minute span – Susan Fink and Danielle Figliola had the others – deflating any hopes Montrose had of hanging around.
“There’s no question there was probably a little bit of an impact from the road trip,” said Montrose coach Mike Frazer, whose team returned to Montrose after Wednesday’s game in Pueblo before coming back to the Front Range on Friday. “We are a better team than what we showed today. This is a quality team, and you just can’t afford to make mistakes against a quality team like that.”
Jacy Drobney, CC Rinehart, Becca Woods and Erin Gunther each added goals for the Raptors, who conversely did not allow a single shot on goal.
Montrose 0 0 – 0
Silver Creek 4 3 – 7
Goals – Burnham (unassisted), 13th minute; Fink (J. Drobney), 16th; Figliola (B. Drobney), 19th; J. Drobney (Burnham), 35th; Rinehart (unassisted), 43rd; Woods (Gunther), 45th; Gunther (Russell), 56th.
Shots on goal – Montrose 0-0 – 0; Silver Creek 10-8 – 18. Saves – Montrose (Beshoar, 64 mins.) 6-3 – 9, (Bony, 16 mins.) 0-2 – 2; Silver Creek (Wolfinger) 0-0 – 0. Corner kicks – Montrose 0-0 – 0; Silver Creek 2-7 – 9. Offsides – Montrose 0-0 – 0; Silver Creek 4-0 – 4. Fouls – Montrose 3-2 – 5; Silver Creek 2-1 – 3. Yellow cards – None.
Jon E. Yunt can be reached at 303-954-1354 or jyunt@denverpost.com.
