St. Louis Stars (NASL)
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| St. Louis Stars | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Full name | St. Louis Stars (NASL) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Founded | 1967-1977 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ground | Busch Memorial Stadium, St. Louis, Missouri, United States (Capacity 30,000) |
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| Chairman | Bob Hermann | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Manager | defunct | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| League | NASL | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1976/77 | NASL, Atlantic Conference, Northern Division 2nd | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The St. Louis Stars were a soccer team based out of St. Louis, Missouri that played in the original NASL from 1967 to 1977.
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[edit] History
The St. Louis Stars, founded in 1967 were the first ever professional soccer team in St. Louis. The team was headed by Bob Hermann who later went on to create the Hermann Trophy, college soccer's version of the Heisman Trophy. St. Louis had a long history of strong play in amateur leagues and a college soccer dynasty and the team immediately stole the spotlight from the amateur clubs and attracted many mainstream sports fans. The Star's average attendance at well over 7,000 was the highest in the league.
Following the 1968 NASL season, the league was in trouble with ten franchises having folded. The 1969 season was split into two halves. The first half was called the International Cup, a double round robin tournament in which the remaining NASL clubs were represented by teams imported from the United Kingdom. The Stars were represented by Kilmarnock F.C. of Scotland. The Stars came in last for the Cup with a 2-5-1 record. For the second half of the 1969 season, the teams returned to their normal rosters and played a 16 game schedule with no playoffs.
The Star's legacy is one of drawing players from the local United States talent pool keeping costs low instead of investing in aging foreign players with high contracts. This strategy is the reason for the Star's longevity (lasting ten seasons during some the NASL's most turbulent times), but often the team was very mediocre and after the first year of success, the team began to draw very poor crowds. From 1967-68 and 1971-74 the Star's played at Busch Memorial Stadium and from 1969-70 and 1975-77 the home games were held at Francis Field. There was an attempt to return to Busch for 1978, but the Stars were not able to secure a lease to their liking. With only small Francis Field available as an option and player salaries rising sharply, there seemed little alternative but to relocate. So after the 1977 season, they packed their bags and moved to Anaheim and became the California Surf.
[edit] Honors
Rookie of the Year
- 1970 Jim Leeker
- 1972 Mike Winter
Coach of the Year
- 1972 Casey Frankiewicz
- 1975 John Sewell
[edit] Notable Players
Pat McBride [1]- Al Trost
- Casey Frankiewicz
- Bob Kehoe[2]
- Dragan Popovic
Ray Evans (footballer) (1977) [3]- John Sewell
- Peter Bonetti (1975)
- Bill Glazier (1976-??)
- Fred Binney (1977)
- Steve Moyers
- Willy Roy[4]
- Don Ceresia
- Barry Salvage (1977)
Dragoslav Šekularac- Geoff Davies (1977) [5]
- Denny Vaninger
[edit] Coaches
- George Mihaljevic (1967)
Rudi Gutendorf (1968)- Bob Kehoe (1969-70)
- George Meyer and Casey Frankiewicz (1971)
- Casey Frankiewicz (1972-73)
- John Sewell (1974-78)
[edit] Average Attendance
- 1967 - 7613
- 1968 - 5388
- 1969 - 2274
- 1970 - 2745
- 1971 - 3579
- 1972 - 7773
- 1973 - 6337
- 1974 - 7374
- 1975 - 6071
- 1976 - 6150
- 1977 - 9794
[edit] Year-by-year
| Year | Record | Regular Season Finish | Playoffs |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1967 | 14-7-11 | 2nd, Western Division | Did Not Qualify |
| 1968 | 12-6-14 | 3rd, Gulf Division | Did Not Qualify |
| 1969 | 3-2-11 | 4th, NASL | Did Not Qualify |
| 1970 | 5-2-17 | 3th, Eastern Division, Northern Division | Did Not Qualify |
| 1971 | 6-5-13 | 4th, Southern Division | Did Not Qualify |
| 1972 | 7-3-4 | 1st, Southern Division | Runners-up |
| 1973 | 7-5-7 | 2nd, Southern Division | Did Not Qualify |
| 1974 | 4-1-15 | 4th, Central Division | Did Not Qualify |
| 1975 | 13-9 | 1st, Central Division | Semi-Finals |
| 1976 | 5-19 | 5th, Pacific Conference, Western Division | Did Not Qualify |
| 1977 | 12-14 | 2nd, Atlantic Conference, Northern Division | First round |
