In many club sports, the best players from Salem join teams based in Portland to play for more successful teams and get noticed.
In the case of the Captial FC Timbers Boys 98 Red, players from the Portland area come to play for a Salem team.
The Capital FC Timbers 98 Red won its sixth state championship in seven years this season.
While the core of the team of Salem-based players has been together for seven years – and won six state championships in that span – Jack Moothart and Alejandro Lee commute from West Linn to play for the CFC red team.
“I think people started realizing what we have here in Salem, which is different,” said Marcos Ochoa, who was a key player in West Salem’s run to the 6A state championship this season.
“Obviously Portland is a much bigger city so a lot of our competition is against the Portland area within state, but this year we got first.”
The core group of players – including Armando Lopez, Diego Olvera, Sam Sinks, Conner Karsseboom, Benje Orozco Jr., Joshua Bailey, Stuart Aeschliman and Ochoa – have been together since they won their first state championship in 2009, mostly under the team name of Real Madrid.
Some players were already playing competitive soccer for the club when the team came together, some were recruited in to it and some had other coaches recommend they join it.
“I think it’s a little bit of everything,” said Miguel Ponce, who attends South Salem.
When the red team won the U17 Boys Oregon OYSA State championship in May, it was the team’s sixth state championship in seven years – 2015 was the one season they didn’t win it.
Some of the players, such as Orozco, left the team, but returned to it.
“It was pretty cool, just being with the same group of guys,” said Karsseboom, who plays at Woodburn. “We all have been successful together, like the same core group, that’s pretty cool.
“We’ve had like new additions each year basically, but the same group of guys have stayed together. That’s pretty cool because the chemistry’s always, always there.”
Mike McGrew was the coach of the team through the state championship game, but took another coaching position and Jared Rust took over for the regional tournament.
Rust, who was the men’s coach at Simpson University the past two seasons and has taken an assistant coach position at Willamette, took over the team heading to the regional tournament.
“They’re able to read each other,” said Rust, who formerly was Sprague’s coach in 2012 and 2013. “They’re able to communicate with each other. They know the gestures. They know people’s strengths, their weaknesses, and it does give them an advantage.
“I think that the only thing that is disadvantage in that regard is that we get a little comfortable with it, and we don’t necessarily hold each other accountable to the level that we’d like because we’re so used to each other and we accept the inconsistencies or the weaknesses of some players, instead of pushing them to become even better than they can be.”
The team next plays in the USYSA Far West Regionals Monday-Sunday in Boise.
The core of the team have made a half dozen trips to the regional tournament and their best result in it was reaching the semifinals when they were U12.
“I think this is our year for Regionals because we’ve always gone there, we’ve done okay, quarters, semis, came home with nothing,” said Aeschliman, the Gatorade Oregon Boys Soccer Player of the Year for West Salem last fall. “I’m just excited to go out there and I think we have a good chance of taking it this year.”
bpoehler@StatesmanJournal.com, 503-399-6701 or Twitter.com/bpoehler