By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

STAYTON, Ore.—When rosters were posted in August and you saw Stayton High School with four seniors on their roster, most probably thought they would go far with Freddie and Ivan Navarro and Chris Shields at the helm.

Fast forward three months to November 14, 2015 as they are walking off the field following their 2-1 OSAA 4A State Championship Loss to Sisters; they walked away with much more.

A 14-1-2 overall record, their sixth-consecutive Oregon West Conference title, Chris Shields as the OWC Coach of the Year.

On top of that, four players made the OWC 2^nd-team, Freddie and Ivan Navarro made the first team and Ivan Navarro won OWC Player of the Year as well as being ranked number one in the state of Oregon for most of the season.

Not bad at all.

“With the group we had, I thought we did pretty good,” said Ivan Navarro. “Honestly, at first, I didn’t think we could make it back here to the finals.  This team proved me wrong and I know they’re thinking the same thing.”

Alex Cramer was in the stands wihen the Eagles won the title in 2010 and remembers seeing that now that he has played on the stage.

“I was here when they won it in 2010 and it was so nice, it was a great feeling to know that you’re doing something you thought was cool back then (now),” he said.

For Shields, he can rest on the fact his team fought their tails off to get better.

“I thought it was a good year,” he said.  “When you return four starters off last year’s roster, to get to the end of the state tournament to be in second place isn’t a bad ending to the little story, it could have been a lot worst.  We just came up a little bit short, that’s all.”

Turning their focus to 2016, the plan is to try to mold new leaders on the team as the Eagles are graduating four seniors including Ivan and Freddie Navarro.

“We got to play well in the offseason,” said Cramer.  “We got to get used to each other.  Get used to not having people like Freddie and Ivan (Navarro), people who can help win the game for us.

“We all need to work together because we are going to be a younger team next year.”

The young guys like sophomore forward Alex Cramer and freshman goalkeeper Jose Navarro will all be looked up to lead this team in 2016 and Cramer knows that without Freddie and Ivan Navarro, he’ll has to be that leader up at the forward position.

“I got to step up and be that guy,” said Cramer.  “We got to have somebody we can trust, to put some weight on and I’m hoping to be that guy.”

Shields said that’ll be all on the kids to make up the difference in the holes left by the graduating seniors.

“It’s on the kids more than anything else,” he said. “They have to double up on their efforts, we’re losing a lot of good players and some of the young guys would really have to step up and play better and play harder.

“They’ll be huge, hopefully we’ll build a team around them.  Around those types of guys, those types of players.  ” added Shields on Cramer and Navarro.  “They’re going to have to play really well with all the good players were losing, but that’s next year.”

Before moving on to 2016, Ivan Navarro was asked what advice he would give to the young guys and this is what he said:

“I can tell them that anything is possible as long as they put in the time and effort and you can accomplish your goals with that,” he said.

2015 Oregon West Conference honors (Via the Stayton Boys Soccer Facebook Page)

Oregon West Conference second team all-league:
Jose Gomez, Alex Cramer, Cris Perigrina, and Christian Gomez