By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

STAYTON, Ore.–It was the first time that Stayton saw action outdoors against another team since the end of last season.

And though there were some familiar faces like Ivan Navarro out playing with the young Eagle team against the senior heavy Woodburn team, Navarro was impressed with how those filling his and the recently graduated  Seniors shoes with the adversity at hand.

“I think they did well,” said Narvarro.  “I mean the team we played today was mostly seniors and we held up our end pretty good considering we have a really young team.”

Jose Gomez led the way with two-goals against the Bulldogs, including a Penalty Kick goal in the second half in the 4-1 victory Friday evening.

“We did pretty good but we need to keep on working like Coach (Chris) Shields says and work as a team and get better and better,” said Gomez.

The main thing that Alex Cramer mentioned that they need to improve on is how to rely more on each other instead of relying on the Navarro cousins as they did the year before.

“We don’t have as skilled of players as we did last year, we can’t rely on one or two guys to carry us down the field,” Cramer said.  “So we’re still getting used to passing the ball around and relying on younger guys, a mixed amount of guys to pass around the ball.  Move the ball around instead of just Ivan and Freddie (Navarro) as we did last year.”

You saw glimpses of confidence in this young team, and though recent graduated seniors in the Navarros won’t be there come August; you saw the younger Stayton athletes stepping up and learning on the run.

Jose Navarro making nice saves as he did the year before, Cramer and Gomez being aggressive.  Bench players from 2015 like Courage Minton stepping up and trying to fill big shoes left by the 2015 seniors.

Minton, entering just his sophomore season, points out some areas of improvement on moving forward that he noticed from Friday’s game.

“I think we need to work on our passes and play together as a team, move the ball more and stuff,” said Minton.

Even though it’s June and with the journey of The Eagle is a long one: this team is already liking where they’ve come from to this point.

“We felt like we got better, as we grew together and play with each other.  We played with each other, we’ve know each other more better and felt more comfortable,” said Gomez.

“We’re learning to trust each other,” added Cramer.  “Learning to depend on each other to score and to move the ball around and just in general trusting each other more than we might’ve last year.  It seems like we’re tighter now.”

Follow Jeremy McDonald on Twitter at @J_McDonald81 or like jmcdonaldmedia of Facebook!

PHOTO GALLERY (PICTURES BY JEREMY MCDONALD)