Victoria Riptides

Victoria Riptides (also known as the RipTides and Riptide) were a professional soccer team based out of Victoria, British Columbia. The team played a for two successful seasons, the 1984 season of the Pacific Coast Soccer League and 1985 season of the Western Alliance Challenge Series.

History

David Keith was coach of the 1984 Riptides. The team had a perfect record (7-0-0), defeating the Vancouver Whitecaps, Nanaimo FC, New Westminster Queen Park Rangers and Richmond United.

In 1985, four independent west coast soccer clubs joined together to create an informal challenge series. The challenge cup pitted the Riptides against F.C. Seattle, F.C. Portland and the San Jose Earthquakes in a home and away series. The cup also included games against the Canadian national soccer team which was training for the 1986 World Cup in Vancouver, BC. The national team was not included in the standings. The teams also played the Edmonton Brickmen. The games against the Brickmen counted in the standings which determined the end of series champions.

The 1985 Riptides had a 3-1-3 record, finishing second to the Earthquakes in the final standings.^[1] The success of the challenge series led to a discussion among the four teams about forming a permanent league or alliance. The Riptides management at the time, which included Brian Hughes, disagreed with this approach and did not participate in future games in what became known as the Western Soccer Alliance. The Western Soccer Alliance became the Western Soccer League in 1989 which merged with the American Soccer League in 1990 to form the American Professional Soccer League.

Year-by-year

3 July 13, 1985	Victoria Riptide	4 - 2	FC Seattle	Victoria, British Columbia
14:00	Ken Garraway	[4]	Bruce Raney Brian Schmetzer	Stadium: Royal Athletic Park Attendance: 450

4 July 20, 1985	Victoria Riptide	3 - 1	FC Portland	Victoria, British Columbia
	Ken Garraway Greg Kern  75'	[5]	Brent Goulet	Stadium: Royal Athletic Park

6 August 9, 1985	FC Seattle	3 - 0	Victoria Riptide	Seattle, Washington
19:30	Bruce Raney  9' Brian Schmetzer  18' Oak  34'	[7][8]		Stadium: Memorial Stadium Attendance: 1628

7 August 17, 1985	San Jose Earthquakes	2 - 1	Victoria Riptide	San Jose, California
	Fred Hamel Chris Dangerfield  85'	[9]	Ken Garraway  21'	Stadium: Spartan Stadium

Exhibition

Roster

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player FW Simon Keith GK Grant Darley GK Steve Aiken FW Ken Garraway DF Scott Weinberg FW Nick Gilbert DF John Hughes

No. Position Player DF Greg Kern MF John McGuire DF John Noble MF George Pakos DF Doug Adlem MF Frank Woods Ken Andrews

References

External links

• Seattle Storm (soccer)
• Portland Timbers (1985–1990)
• Victoria Vistas (1989-1990)
• http://davfal.powweb.com/museum/FCSeattleStorm.htm
• http://a-leaguearchive.tripod.com/1985/1985.htm