Hood River Youth Lacrosse 5th/6th grade boys close out dominant 2026 Season

HOOD RIVER — The Hood River Youth Lacrosse Boys 5th/6th Grade team finished 18–1, won the Sisters Annual Lacrosse Invitational (SALI), and placed third at the Oregon Cup.

The team, led by sixth year Coach Chris Eaton, finished with one of its more dominant seasons to date.

“SALI is my favorite tournament of the year. Lots of good competition shows up, and it’s a really fun, tough tournament,” Eaton said. “The whole atmosphere in the town of Sisters is great. Lacrosse kids take over the whole place.”

Hood River’s attack unit featured contributions from Duncan Eaton, Jackson Larivee, Rocco Petros, Ryder Neal, Declan Donica, Cole McFarland, Rokas Mayo, Aidan Vinyard, and Harris Larson. The midfield group included: Lukas Jones, Luke Holmson, Oliver Mock, Revel Giacchino Sloan, Henry Keim, Taj Larson, Vince Alvis, Griffin Alcott, Colton Jones, and Finn Mullon.

“The guys worked so hard this season and really learned how to play good team lacrosse. We put a lot of emphasis on winning ground balls, and the boys really hustled and ground out a lot of 50/50 balls. It’s always fun to score goals, but the reason we won so many games this year was the hustle in the middle of the field, which isn’t flashy, but it simply wins.”

The defensive unit featured Conrad Helfrich, Josiah Viramontes Vega, Wells Storm, and Reid Moore. In net, Dalton Neal delivered a standout season, making clutch saves in both tournament runs.

“The competition was stiff. There’s some really good teams coming out of the larger programs in Portland. Somehow in Hood River we seem to always be the smaller team physically, but they played really tough and didn’t let that intimidate them.”

For Eaton, the most meaningful part of the season wasn’t the wins; it was how the boys played together.

“What’s really special is that they played as a team; relied on each other and trusted each other,” he said. “Everyone contributed something to the win, and there was no single player that tried to do too much. Unselfish team play is hard to beat.”