It was a big game, for sure. A chance for the Little School by the Canal to once again burnish its image as a collegiate soccer upstart. Oh, yeah, and have witnesses coast-to-coast.
Such was the set-up 40 years ago, when Seattle Pacific met Southern Illinois-Edwardsville in the second game of the 1979 season. The Falcons were defending NCAA Division II champion and SIUE arrived in Seattle ranked No. 4 in all the land, having reached the Div. I quarterfinals the previous season. And a new cable network, hungry for live content, saw fit to televise it.