A Brief History of The Penticton Soccer Club May Classic
We organized the First Annual Penticton Soccer Tournament in 1961. The games were played at Queens Park with four teams participating: Mount Pleasant Legion of Vancouver; Danubia of Vancouver; Grand Forks and Penticton. Mount Pleasant Legion won the “A” Championship against Danubiaby a 8:0 score. Penticton won the “B” Championship against Grand Forks by a 1:0 score. The organizers of the tournament were Charlie Goeckel, Les Roberts, Nick Holtz, Peter Osborne, Hermann Heyer and Helmut Gedig. A dance was held at the Incola Hotel. Every single participant of the tournament showed up and made it a great success. Okanagan Testing Services sponsored the “A” trophy. Kenco Millwork sponsored the “B” trophy.
The following year in 1963 we had eight teams participating. Teams from Victoria, Prince George, Lower Mainland and Penticton. Lobbans F.C. ofVancouver won against Danubia by a 3:2 score in the “A” Championship game. In the “B” Championship game Mount Pleasant Legion of Vancouver won against Prince George by a score of 3:2.
The tournament became one of the best in Western Canada in a very short period of time. Top teams from Alberta and B.C. took part and the tournament grew to 16 teams. Royal Oaks of Vancouver, Calgary United, Dutch Lions of Vancouver, Calgary Springer Kickers, Vancouver Fire Fighters, Westminster Blues, Nomads of Vancouver, Nor Van S.C. All these clubs were provincial champions and some were Canadian champions. Those teams came toPenticton for many years and made our tournament a great success.
In the 1980 and 1990 years different teams came to play and were successful in the tournament. Powell River, Molly Hogans of Vancouver, Aldergrove F.C., Cliff Ave. United, Metro Ford F.C., Surrey United, Richmond F.C. and PoGo City Dominion. All these teams won the championship in our tournament and some repeated a number of times.
From 2000 – 2010 the following teams were very successful winning the championship trophy: Black Knights, William Lake S.C. and PoGo City Dominion F.C. Estrella De Chille won the last four years. In the history of this tournament Penticton S.C. has won the “A” championship 5 times.
In 2011 we hosted the 50th Annual May Classic Soccer Tournament and we enjoyed bringing some of the top teams from BCand Alberta back to make our tournament one of the best in the Province.
