Did Jimmy Carter Save Championship Season For Pennsylvania Stoners?

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There is no question that the stingy defense corps contributed greatly as the PENNSYLVANIA STONERS steamrolled to the American Soccer League title in the summer of 1980. After arriving from the State University of New York at Cortland a year earlier, shot-stopper SCOTT MANNING wasted little time in establishing himself as one of the best in the all the A.S.L. while keeping balls out of the back of the net at the old Allentown School District Stadium. What remains unanswered, however, as the years pass is what might have been for Hungarian immigrant WILLIE EHRLICH’s home-grown side had the military of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics not invaded Afghanistan on Christmas Eve in 1979?

Now, the triumphant Stoners closed out the regular season having conceded a league-low 29 goals in 28 A.S.L. matches but would that have been the case had world history somehow worked out differently?

Ehrlich’s first choice goalkeeper was formally selected to the final United States squad that had managed to qualify for the Games of the XXII Olympiad to be hosted by the city of Moscow. Fortunately for the Pennsylvania Stoners’ owner and trainer, the second-worst President in the history of the Home of the Free and the Land of the Brave had already publically announced that the good ole’ U.S.A. would officially boycott the 1980 Summer Games before the American Soccer League season even started in late April of that year. And so Manning, who easily paced the A.S.L. with a 1.01 goals-against-average per game while saving an impressive 85.47% of shots faced (25 goals allowed) over the course of the 1980 A.S.L. campaign, did not take a break right in the middle of the Stoners championship run and make a once-in-a-lifetime trip to the Soviet Unon for the Moscow Olympics.

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It is July 20, 1980 — the very first day of competition for the football tournament of the Games of the XXII Olympiad hosted by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The defending gold medalists from the German Democratic Republic and Spain each score within a minute of each other to draw 1-1 in Group C while 100,000 spectators watch at the Republican Stadium in the Ukrainian city of Kiev. Meanwhile, at the massive Grand Arena of the Central Lenin Stadium (103,000 capacity at that time), the home-standing U.S.S.R. thrash Venezuela 4-0 to open Group A.

Thousands and thousands of miles to the west at the modest A.S.D. Stadium (which had a capacity for 20,000 at that time) in the mid-Atlantic region of the eastern United States, one would-be U.S. Olympic team member is warming up with Pennsylvania Stoners as they prepare to meet the visiting Cleveland Cobras in an American Soccer League match.

Thanks in part to a three-goal effort from ROMAN URBANCZYK, the Polish Cannon produced by Louis E. Dieruff High School over on the city’s East Side, the Stoners strangle the Cobras 5-2 in front of a hearty 3,808 spectators.

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The 1980 Olympic football tournament will conclude on August 2 in front of a reported crowd of 70,000 at the Grand Arena of the Central Lenin Stadium in Moscow when the East Germans fail to successfully defend their crown in the Gold Medal Match and fall to Czechoslovakia 1-0 on a goal scored in the last quarter hour.

One day later, at the old A.S.D. Stadium in Allentown, the Pennsylvania Stoners get two goals from ADRIAN BROOKS (Philadelphia College of Textiles & Science) and trounce the in-coming Miami Americans 5-0 before a crowd of 3,851 people. Ehrlich’s in-form side are only just embarking on a streak which will see the second-year team win nine consective matches in a row. And, almost needless to say, the goalkeeper Scott Manning is playing a very integral part.

Even with the benefit of hindsight, it is difficult to assess what the absence of the first choice might have meant to the team. For starters, it is difficult to say with certainty how Pennsylvania Stoners management would have elected to address the situation had the U.S. boycott of the Moscow Summer Games not been enacted before the A.S.L. season began. Also, among other things, it is almost impossible to say for sure exactly how far the United States would have progressed at the 1980 Olympic tournament, itself.

But, then again, it is interesting to wonder what might have been …

Scoring Pennsylvania Stoners Goals To Soaring With Nigeria’s Green Eagles

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1980 American Soccer League champion PENNSYLVANIA STONERS …….. Nigeria international striker CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA is second from left in the back row standing next to former college teammate and Stoners reserve goalkeeper BILL FINNEYFROCK.
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September 14, 1980 … A partisan crowd of 8,139 (second-largest of the season) arrive at the old Allentown School District Stadium for the first home playoff contest of the current American Soccer League campaign. The colorful PENNSYLVANIA STONERS, proudly sporting their now-famous Alpo dog food kit, play host to the visiting NEW YORK UNITED complete with aging Argentina international NARCISO DOVAL, the 36-year-old former CA San Lorenzo (Arg), CR Flamengo and CF Fluminese (both Brazil) attacking talent who finished tied for second place in the A.S.L. with 12 goals during the regular season. Following the 1-1 draw the previous week in New York, this return encounter will be a winner-take-all affair in the home and home, total-goals tie.

Thanks in part to a goal apiece from a pair of Clemson University products, the Stoners see off the New York United 3-1 and triumphantly march into the A.S.L. championship match. Midfielder CLYDE WATSON, the native of Guyana who had been honored as a league All-Star in 1979 after a fine rookie term with the now-dormant New York Eagles, will actually return for another season of professional soccer at A.S.D. Stadium and ultimately lead owner / trainer WILLIE EHRLICH’s last team with 11 goals in 1981. In stark contrast, however, striker CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA — who led Ehrlich’s original enstallment with 13 goals on its maiden voyage in 1979 — had found the back of the net one final time while fashioning the legendary Pennsylvania Stoners uniform.

Ehrlich’s side would defeat the defending champions, the incoming Sacramento Gold, exactly four days later and be deservedly crown the A.S.L.’s king. Barely a fortnight thereafter, the title-winning striker from Nigeria came on to start the second half as a substitute for new club Sporting Lisbon in a 1-1 exhibition draw with the touring New York Cosmos — the reigning champions in the North American Soccer League — at the old Estadio Jose Alvalade in the capital city of Portugal. Nwokocha would find competition for a place with the “Leoes” (Lions) to be stiff, particularly with the likes of experienced Portugal international strikers such as club veterans RUI JORDAO (43 caps, 15 go) and MANUEL FERNANDES (30 caps, 7 go) both on hand.

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CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA, Sporting Clube de Portugal
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Up to this point in time, the Green Eagles national side had, for whatever reason, always declined to recall players based overseas. Many people to this day insist Nigeria would have qualified for the final tournament of the 1978 FIFA World Cup hosted by Argentina had then-NCAA goal-scoring wizard THOMPSON USIYAN of Appalachian State University in North Carolina not been bypassed by the national team trainer. Matters were re-evaluated after the Nigerians won the Africa Nations Cup for the very first time ever in March of 1980 but lost its 1982 FIFA Word Cup first round, first leg qualifying match to Tunisia just three months later.

Winger JOHN CHIEDOZIE and midfielder TUNJI BANJO of English Second Division side FC Leyton Orient were both drafted into the national team for the second leg with the Tunisians, an affair which saw the Nigerians level the tie and eventually advance only after penalty kicks. The Green Eagles continued to sputter, though, and could only draw 1-1 at home in Lagos against unheralded Tanzania several months later at the beginning of December. And so, the former Pennsylvania Stoners striker now on the books at powerful Portuguese club Sporting Lisbon (and destined to become 1981/82 Primera Divisao champion under new English trainer Malcolm Allison) was inserted into the Nigeria line-up for the return leg in Dar es Salaam.

December 20, 1980 … A scoreless draw would be enough to do the trick for Tanzania but the legionnaire Chiedozie wrecked that idea with a first-ever goal for the Green Eagles five minutes into the match in front of a reported 50,000 at the old National Stadium. The speedy winger was only months away from being sold by Leyton Orient to newly-promoted First Division outfit Notts County for the new club record of 600,000 English pounds and would later join well-known London club Tottenham Hotspur a few years on. Of course, the Tanzanians had come up with a second half equalizer two weeks earlier on the road in Lagos and, thus, still had all to play for.

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The old NATIONAL STADIUM (above) in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, was originally constructed in 1961 and, technically, always listed a capacity for only 25,000 spectators. However, as a person can easily see, the facility was always one that unofficially allowed for overflow crowds that would prove difficult for any sort of hard and fast head-count of passionate Tanzanian football fans arriving to cheer on the national side in a World Cup qualifer, just for example. Nowadays, the east African country on the coast of the Indian Ocean has a new football field for the Taifa Stars, the BENJAMIN MKAPA NATIONAL STADIUM, a modern arena which was built to meet exisiting FIFA and Olympic standards in 2007 and officially holds 60,000 people.
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But another foreign-based attacker would hammer a final nail in Tanzania’s World Cup coffin with his first-ever goal for the Nigeria senior national side. It was Nwokocha, then, who stoned the home team’s hopes of a Spanish adventure to death with a second strike eleven minutes from time at the National Stadium in Dar es Salaam. A Tiger’s spectacular transition from firing A.S.L. goals in Allentown’s West End to filling the net in the prestigous FIFA World Cup had been completed!

Allentown Asantehene Leads Pennsylvania Stoners To ASL Title

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GEORGE GORLEKU (3), seen here in the shirt of Eastern Illinois University, was chosen an NCAA First Team All-America defender in both 1976 and 1978 before who graduating with a degree in Business. The former sweeper, who is presently hailed as the most decorated soccer player in the school’s history by the official website of the E.I.U. athtletic department, was also selected to the Second Team as a freshman in 1975 and tabbed as Honorable Mention in 1977. Gorleku, as one might imagine of an always rare four-year All-America, is enshrined in the school’s athletic Hall of Fame.
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It was, as the contemporary musical group Styx used to sing back then, the best of times in the so-called City With No Limits. The storied PENNSYLVANIA STONERS, brainchild of the innovative Hungarian immigrant and former European professional footballer WILLIE EHRLICH, certainly were rocking the old Allentown School District Stadium over in the West End section. In only their second year of existance and employing a spirited squad almost exclusively made up of American college players, the remarkable Stoners would romp to the very best record in the eight-team American Soccer League during that memorable summer of 1980.

It was a stingy Stoners defense that conceded the fewest goals in the entire circuit (29 in 28 matches) with accomplished goalkeeper SCOTT MANNING (State University of New York-Cortland) as well as rock-solid JEFF TIPPING (Hartwick College) and North American Soccer League castoff KEN MCDONALD (Penn State University) all featuring prominently. The anchor of the Stoners backline that year, however, was unquestionably former Eastern Illinois University standout sweeper GEORGE GORLEKU, a native of Ghana whom Ehrlich had wisely snapped up and brought to Allentown after the demise of the Indianapolis Daredevils at the close of the 1979 A.S.L. campaign. Gorleku, who had been drafted by the Seattle Sounders of the NASL — a team stuffed full of former English and Scottish professionals — but opted to sign elsewhere coming out of college, would more than validate this decision by the two-time A.S.L. Coach of the Year.

BOB EHRLICH, the Pennsylvania Stoners local legend from Behtlehem’s Liberty High School and former Penn State University midfielder on the 1980 A.S.L. champion squad, spoke highly of Gorleku’s defensive abilities, “Whenever he took the ball from an opponent, it looked like it was his ball to begin with and the other guy was trying to take it from him!”

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1980 PENNSYLVANIA STONERS … A.S.L. Most Valuable Player GEORGE GORLEKU is fifth from right in the back row.
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There is an old school of thought that says it is the greatest players who save their best performances for the biggest matches. Gorleku surely did much to subscribe to this philosophy, then, after being named the A.S.L. Most Valuable Player shortly after the regular season ended. The New York United had been summarily dispatched in the semifinals as the Pennsylvania Stoners rolled into the league title game.

It was a crowd of 7,723 that had congregated at the old ASD Stadium in the West End of Allentown to watch the hometown team take on the visiting Sacramento Gold for the rights to A.S.L. supremacy on a mid-September night. The title contest had figured to be a battle between the league’s two top goaltenders but a throw-in had produced a loose ball in the Sacramento defensive third and the Stoners sweeper pounced. Gorleku’s booming shot from distance eluded Sacramento’s distinguished goalkeeper TOM REYNOLDS (himself a future Pennsylvania Stoners player) and tucked into the upper left hand corner of the net to break a scoreless deadlock.

Ehrlich’s team were well on its way to its finest hour … ironically enough, it was Gorleku who had previously scored a second half game-winning-goal when the Sacramento Gold and Pennsylvania Stoners had met earlier in the year out on the West Coast right around the annual July Fourth holiday, as well.

1979 – A Season Of Firsts For Pennsylvania Stoners

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April 29, 1979. A landmark moment for professional sports in the medium-sized city on the mid-eastern edge of the state, then, as a noteworthy crowd of 7,487 fans fill the bowl that was the old Allentown School District Stadium to witness the fledgling PENNSYLVANIA STONERS take on the defending American Soccer League champions, the New York Apollos. Although the would-be A.S.L. Coach of the Year WILLIE EHRLICH’s side put up a good fight, the team from the Empire State secures triumph by the minumum scoreline.

The resilient Stoners, however, will bounce back quickly to record the first-ever victory in front of the home folk just a few days later at the beginning of May. KEITH TOZER, fresh from his inaugural American pro soccer adventure with the Cincinnati Kids of the Major Indoor Soccer League, finds the back of the net for Pennsylvania shortly into the second half against the New York Eagles, therefore, becomes the first Stoner to ever score a goal at the A.S.D. Stadium. And, thus, Ehrlich’s squad registers the franchise’s first of what will be many, many triumphs on home soil in the seasons to follow.

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KEITH TOZER, Cincinnati Kids (MISL)
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The Pennsylvania Stoners strenghtened the attack with the addition of former Clemson University star striker CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA, who had opened the 1979 campaign with the Tulsa Roughnecks in the rival (and richer) North American Soccer League, after first seven A.S.L. games had already passed. The youthful Nigerian was able to elevate the attack and would finish as the first ever top shot in Stoners history with 13 goals in 21 league contests. Nwokocha also combined well with STEVE LONG, who scored 10 goals and added six assists while appearing in all 28 A.S.L. games.

American Soccer League – 1979 goal-scoring chart
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15 goals … Poli GARCIA, California Sunshine
15 goals … Joey FINK, California Sunshine
14 goals … Ian FILBY, Sacramento Gold
13 goals … Christian NWOKOCHA, Pennsylvania Stoners
13 goals … Ron WIGG, Columbus Magic
12 goals … Andy CHAPMAN, California Sunshine
12 goals … Colin MCLOUCKLAN, Indianapolis Daredevils

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CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA
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A third place finish (13 wins, 10 losses, 5 draws) in the six-team Eastern Division was enough to earn Ehrlich’s expansion side an American Soccer League playoff appearance at the very first attempt and so the Pennsylvania Stoners took to the road for a one-game showdown with the second-placed New York Eagles squad (14 wins, 7 losses, 7 draws) in the state capital of Albany.

The Eagles went out in front first but the visitors were able to rally for two goals inside the final twenty minutes, with Nwokocha earning the assist on both occasions. ORMAND CUMMINS leveled matters in the 72nd minute before midfield PAUL DESBOIS was able to provide the Pennsylvania Stoners the triumph by finding the back of the net with less than seven minutes to play. A first playoff victory at the very first try for Ehrlich’s troops, then.

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Pennsylvania Stoners midfielder BLAZ STIMAC (right), who was a two-time little All-America at tiny East Stroudsburg State College in northeastern Pennsylvania before turning professional with the Cleveland Force for the 1978/79 Major Indoor Soccer League campaign, races for the ball with Columbus Magic midfielder RAY SCHNETTGOECKE (4) during an American Soccer League match at the Franklin County Stadium in 1979.

American Soccer League’s PA Stoners Set National Football League Record

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MATT BAHR (Penn State University) with the Pittsburgh Steelers
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Although few, if anyone, are probably aware of such, the old PENNSYLVANIA STONERS playing in the old Allentown School District Stadium in the long-since-departed American Soccer League actually hold a very unique sort of record in the National Football League which stands to this very day.

The ’79 expansion Stoners, in fact, are the only professional soccer team in the entire world to have ever two N.F.L. placekickers, past or present, on the roster in the same season — a mark which, in all likelihood, will never be equaled.

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FLORIAN KEMPF (University of Pennsylvania) with the Houston Oilers
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Oddly enough, the leading goal-scorer for the Pennsylvania Stoners had a certain habit of hanging around with future N.F.L. placekickers although CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA was never one, himself; aside from spending time with MATT BAHR and FLORIAN KEMPF with Stoners during the 1979 American Soccer League season, the Nigerian had previously been college soccer teammates at Clemson University with OBED ARIRI.

Ariri, who made four appearances with the Chicago Sting during the 1980 North American Soccer League season, was drafted in 1981 by the NFL’s Baltimore Colts and finally made his regular season debut a few years later for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

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OBED ARIRI (Clemson University) with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Stoners Expansion Season Lays Foundation For Title To Follow

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ORMAND CUMMINS on the ball for the Pennsylvania Stoners seeks to split the pair of Columbus Magic defenders as Stoners forward ROMAN URBANCZUK (far left), who made his professional debut with the Cleveland Force in the Major Indoor Soccer League, anticipates a pass during the 1979 American Soccer League contest at the Franklin County Stadium in the capital city of Ohio.
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PENNSYLVANIA STONERS founder WILLIE EHRLICH, a survivor of the notorious Auschwitz concentration camp, was absolutely no stranger to overcoming adversity. In direct comparison to some of life’s other, by far, more difficult challenges that the Hungarian immigrant businessman had already had been forced to contend with, the task of putting together a professional team from scratch to compete in the American Soccer League must have seemed to be not much more than a relaxing walk in the park, really. A former professional player, himself, some twenty years earlier, Ehrlich would prove to also be an astute judge of talent while also serving as the trainer of the expansion club.

MATT BAHR, an All-American placekicker for the powerful Penn State University football team, was easily the player with the highest profile to sign on with the fledgling Stoners in the spring of 1979. The soon to be 23-year-old had already spent the summer of 1978 on the backline for the Colorado Caribous (24 games, 3 assists) and Tulsa Roughnecks (2 games) in the North American Soccer League before returning to Happy Valley for his senior season on the football gridiron as well as the soccer pitch. Bahr’s stay with the Pennsylvania Stoners in the ASL would last only into July, however, when the 6th round draft pick (# 165 overall) of the Pittsburgh Steelers departed the West End of Allentown for his first training camp with the National Football League club.

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Future Pennsylvania Stoners fullback MATT BAHR (3) of the Colorado Caribous can not deny the ball to New York Cosmos attacker GARY ETHERINGTON (21), the English-born winger who moved to Virginia while in high school and ultimately earned six caps for the national team of the United States, during a 1978 North American Soccer League match at Giants Stadium on the other side of the Hudson River in that state of New Jersey.
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Two recognizable local products from next-door-neighbor Bethlehem were also quickly recruited by the Stoners with the additions of Liberty High School aulum BOBBY EHRLICH, who had been a teammate of Bahr with the successful Penn State soccer program, as well as Freedom High School graduate RON OST, who had gone off to New England to pay his collegiate soccer at Harvard University. Another homegrown talent to be found on the first year roster for the Pennsylvania Stoners was 20-year-old ROMAN URBANCZUK, who had cut his professional teeth with the Cleveland Force during the 1978/79 Major Indoor Soccer League season, from Dieruff High School on the East Side of Allentown.

Logically, Ehrlich looked to strengthen his new team with players already having at least some professional experience and nabbed versatile ART NAPOLITANO, the 23-year-old who played eight NASL games with the Houston Hurricane in the summer of 1978 and then spent the subsequent winter in the MISL with the Pittsburgh Spirit. It had been Napolitano who scored the headed the first goal of the championship match when little Hartwick College from upstate New York defeated the mighty University of San Francisco 2-1 to win the 1977 NCAA Tournament Final. The Pennsylvania Stoners also inked the very same winger who had scored the all-important second that day for Hartwick College, STEVE LONG, the native of Zaire who had grown up in Brazil.

BLAZ STIMAC had been a star at East Stroudsburg State College in northeastern Pennsylvania and then netted eight goals in 17 games for the Cleveland Force during the 1978/79 season. 22-year-old KEITH TOZER (State University of New York at Oneata) had just completed his rookie pro season for the Cincinnati Kids, whose owners included Cincinnati Reds baseball superstar Pete Rose, during the 78/79 MISL campaign. And, the Pennsylvania Stoners also acquired 23-year-old midfielder FLORIAN KEMPF (University of Pennsylvania), like Bahr, another future National Football League placekicker who had gotten four games for the Philadelphia Fury during the 1978 NASL season.

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Would-be 1980 United States Olympic goalkeeper SCOTT MANNING, who enjoyed an excellent rookie season in the American Soccer League with the fledgling Pennsylvania Stoners, minds the net for the Buffalo Stallions during a Major Indoor Soccer League match at the since-demolished Buffalo Memorial Auditorium in the winter of 1979/80.
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The would-be American Soccer League Coach of the Year both 1979 and 1980 also made some astute signings from the collegiate ranks, as well. Goalkeeper SCOTT MANNING (State University of New York at Cortland) was brought in by Ehrlich as first choice between the sticks for the Stoners and finished third in the eleven-team ASL circut for save percentage in his rookie season. Liverpool native JEFF TIPPING, who had been chosen as Defensive MVP for Hartwick College at the 1977 NCAA tournament, also arrived in Alentown and would become an all-star defender while wearing the captain’s armband and anchoring the backline for the Pennsylvania Stoners. Another find was, 19-year-old JOHN O’HARA, who had just two seasons under his belt at the University of Pittsburgh but, ultimately, went on to play seven seasons of pro ball in the MISL with the Pittsburgh Spirit, Cleveland Force and Minnesota Kicks.

The player who would actually pace the Pennsylvania Stoners in scoring for the maiden voyage across the sea of professional soccer in the United States did not arrive in Allentown well after the 1979 ASL season had already started. CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA, who eneded his career at Clemson University in South Carolina as the ACC school’s all-time leading scorer with 61 goals, had first signed a contract with the Memphis Rogues of the NASL. But the Nigerian managed to strike but once in five matches for Memphis and so it was off to ASD Stadium in the city’s West End.

Nwokocha quickly found his form in a Stoners shirt, however, and ended up tied for third-best in the league having shot 13 goals in just 21 ASL contests; the expansion Pennsylvania side, in the meantime, saw off the visiting Cleveland Cobras 3-1 in front of 6,224 spectators (the second largest crowd of the season) at the old Allentown School District Stadium to conclude their inaugural professional campaign. A mark of 13 wins and 10 losses with five draws was sufficient to earn Ehrlich’s club a berth in the playoffs, but that is another Stoners’s Story …

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Striker CHRISTIAN NWOKOCHA (right) was just the first of several talented, one-time Clemson University products to travel north and sign with the emerging Pennsylvania Stoners of the American Soccer League … no fewer than four ex-Tigers would take part in the Stoners’ title-winning campaign of 1980.

Ehrlich’s American Dream Is Allentown’s Reality Show

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America has long been famously known as the Land of Opportunity for those born both here as well as abroad. And so, once upon a time in a blue collar, industrial city called Bethlehem, a local Hungarian immigrant businessman named WILLIE EHRLICH dared to pursue his own particular vision of American Exceptionalism. A feat many of his contemporary countrymen would have been inclined to believe impossible — to capture a championship in professional soccer using a good supply of homegrown players from right here in the Lehigh Valley.

The upstart PENNSYLVANIA STONERS — employing a trio of products from the local high schools of Freedom and Liberty in Bethlehem as well as Louis E. Dieruff in Allentown — spectacularly made Ehrlich’s dream a reality in just two years’ time when the club captured the American Soccer League title in 1980.

Professional soccer’s popularity in the United States had already peaked by the time the Pennsylvania Stoners contested their first league match and Ehrlich, who was named the A.S.L. Coach of the Year twice, would incur financial losses of almost a million dollars in only three short seasons. But the logo of ALPO, a local dog food manufacturer, delightfully decorated the team’s jerseys while a memorable bumper sticker — “Fifteen Games On One Tank Of Gas” — colorfully adorned the backs of many cars in the area to celebrate the shoe-string budget. And the team was triumphant on the pitch most of the time, as well; in short, it was a whole lot of fun while it lasted.

There can be no question that Ehrlich’s long-gone creation left a lasting legacy which exists to this very day in the Lehigh Valley by fostering an affinity and appreciation for The Beautiful Game to an entire generation of fans in the region — including a certain, unnamed 11-year-old kid who would later play his high school soccer in the very same stadium where the Pennsylvania Stoners used to perform and then, many moons on down the line, get his hands on a blog.

The memories are quite numerous and include a special, rain-soaked evening in April of 1980 on which a franchise record 8,300 people braved the elements at the since-remodeled as well as renamed Allentown School District Stadium (which had a capacity for 20,000 at that time) in the West End to witness the city’s own Polish cannon, ROMAN URBANCZUK, fire the game-winning goal in double overtime as the Pennsylvania Stoners dispatched the visiting Miami Americans 1-0 to open the A.S.L. title-winning campaign. The 21-year-old native of eastern Europe had been honored as a high school All-American at Dieruff on the East Side of town before signing his first pro contract to play the 1978/79 season with the Cleveland Force of the Major Indoor Soccer League. Urbanczuk, who also appeared with the Philadelphia Fever in the old M.I.S.L. during his playing days, would become the one and only player to play every season with the Pennsylvania Stoners during their four-year stay in the since-departed American Soccer League.

Urbanczuk went on later that season to score the only goal of the game at ASD Stadium when the eventual A.S.L. champion shutout the incoming Golden Gate Gales in early August, but that would be another Stoners Story for some other day …