A moment in history: Sept. 25, 1989

On this day in 1989, Edmonton's Brick Men pro soccer team had its playoff hopes dashed in Vancouver.

The Brick Men were the third professional soccer team to call Edmonton home during the 1980s. The first, and probably best known, were the Drillers. Owned by Oilers owner Peter Pocklington, the team played from 1979 to 1982. Then came the Edmonton Eagles, which actually won the Canadian Professional Soccer League championship in 1983. And they never relinquished that title, as the league folded the day after the final game.

In 1985, Pocklington took another shot at running a pro soccer team in the city, forming the Edmonton Brick Men. The name didn't come from the city's history of brickmaking in the river valley. Rather, the team was named after its corporate sponsor, The Brick.

During their first year, the Brick Men didn't play in a league. They did take part in the Western Soccer Alliance's challenge series, which saw teams from Canada, the U.S., and Europe face off against both Canada's national team and the Brick Men. Edmonton had a solid showing during the series, with four wins, three draws, and a single loss to Scotland's Dundee FC. When the WSA started a full season the next year, Edmonton joined the league, playing out of John Ducey Park and Clarke Stadium. In their first full season, they came last of seven teams.

They jumped to the newly formed Canadian Soccer League in 1987, with a slightly better 7-7-6 showing before being knocked out of the first round of the playoffs by Vancouver. 1988 was a dismal year for the team, which won only four of 28 games.

After another playoff elimination by Vancouver the next year, the Brick Men played their final season in 1990, when they failed to make the playoffs. By then, interest in the team had withered, and attendance numbers were falling. The team was disbanded.

The Brick Men never saw the success of some of Edmonton's more storied sports teams. But that doesn't mean it didn't leave a legacy. Several well-known names in soccer played for the Brick Men early in their careers. These include Canadian Soccer Hall of Fame inductee Paul Dolan, English player and well-known soccer commentator Ray Hudson, and most notably Justin Fashanu, the soccer star who later became the first openly gay pro player.

Edmonton would see several more attempts at a pro soccer team after the Brick Men, including FC Edmonton, which folded in 2022. In recent years, interest among young players has grown significantly. In August, youth coach Marni Devlin Moses started gathering signatures to bring a pro franchise back to the city with the women's Northern Super League.

This clipping was found on Vintage Edmonton, a daily look at Edmonton's history from armchair archivist Rev Recluse of Vintage Edmonton.