By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
SALEM, Ore.– Benje Orozco knows a thing or two about coaching Soccer at the High School level.
From 2013-2016, he coached Boys Soccer at West Salem. Then, also at West Salem, coached Girls Soccer for three years between the covid-shortened season with the Spring 2021 season through the 2023 season.
After some time away from coaching, he’s back on the pitch coaching as Head Coach of the Blanchet Catholic Boys Soccer team. Taking over the position after the departure of Zach Ramirez, who helped lead the Cavaliers program to the 3A/2A/1A State Semi’s last Fall.
Orozco has seen the program developed into a respectable program at the classification, with his son Cristian being a part of it the past three years. Cristian Orozco was a second team 3A/2A/1A All-State player as a junior and is returning this season for his senior year as a Goalie and field player for Blanchet.
“I’ve been in the stands with this program for the past three years with the boys, just watching Cristian play. Zach did an amazing job with the program. Watching the improvement from Year 1 when Cristian was a freshman to last year making it to the State Semi’s, (Ramirez) set the bar pretty high,” smiles Orozco. “I’m excited. I know that we lost a core group of seniors. But every year, it’s time for the younger guys step up into leadership roles.
“There’s a decent group of junior kids coming through, I got two or three seniors that are experienced, solid players. It’ll be fun to watch them gel into their own group and trying to continue the tradition that Zach set with the program that he set-up three years prior.”
Wednesday morning saw the elder Orozco hold a summer training for the squad. In seven weeks, on September 3, Blanchet travels to play Oregon Episcopal to open the season. For Orozco, these next few weeks are going to be big in setting up for what he hopes to be another strong season for the Cavs coming off of their third-straight trip to the State Playoffs.
The line-up will be the big question that Orozco will be looking to answer as Blanchet graduated seven seniors from last year’s squad. At least five of those seniors started for the Cavaliers as part of their 10-5-1 squad.
“Right now, my biggest question is who’s going to be playing in my back line, and how I’m going to set up my midfield and my attacking and forward lines,” Orozco said. “The last few years, we have had a lot of kids who like to play the attacking roles. It’s going to take figuring out who do we put in what spots for the good of the team and the kids internalized that, ‘hey I want to play as a midfielder or forward, but I can help my team the most if I play defense and help solidify that back line.
“So we got some homework to do the next few weeks once try-outs start and figure out what our lineup is going to be. Maybe a couple of games into the preseason, try a few things and see how it all turns out.”
