1971 NASL Professional Hoc-Soc Tournament
| 1971 NASL Indoor Tournament | |
|---|---|
| Tournament details | |
| Dates | March 19, 1971 |
| Teams | 4 |
| Final positions | |
| Champions | Dallas Tornado (1st title) |
| Runners-up | Rochester Lancers |
| Tournament statistics | |
| Matches played | 4 |
| Goals scored | 12 (3 per match) |
| Attendance | 5,060 (1,265 per match) |
| Top scorer(s) |
 Mike Renshaw Jim Benedek Dragan Popović(2 goals) |
| Best player |
Mike Renshaw
|
The 1971 NASL Professional Hoc-Soc Tournament was the first indoor variant of soccer sanctioned by the North American Soccer League. It was held in St. Louis, Missouri on the evening of March 19, 1971 and involved four of the league’s eight franchises.
Indoor soccer tournaments had been played in one form or another in North America throughout much of the 20th Century, but 1971 marked the first time that a Division One professional league organized an indoor competition for its member clubs. The total purse was $2,800. The winning side received $1,000, while the runners-up earned $750. The winners and losers of the third place match made $600 and $450 respectively.
The matches themselves were all played on March 19 at the St. Louis Arena. Individual matches lasted 30 minutes and were divided by an intermission into two 15-minute periods. Golden goal overtime was in place to break any tie after regulation time if needed. The first two matches were scheduled for 8:00 PM and 8:45 PM starts, with the others to follow at unspecified times.
Four of the NASL’s five established franchises participated: the Dallas Tornado, Rochester Lancers, St. Louis Stars and Washington Darts. The Atlanta Chiefs did not. The other three NASL squads, Montreal, New York and Toronto, were all expansion teams set to begin play in the 1971 outdoor season, which was starting a few weeks later.
The basic premise of hoc-soc, was to combine several of the rules of hockey with small-side soccer. The playing surface was AstroTurf and the field dimensions were the same as a standard NHL hockey rink (200 feet by 85 feet), surrounded by dasher boards. The goals were set into the end boards and essentially cut in half (12 feet across by 8 feet high). As in hockey, the dasher boards were in play. Rosters were nine players strong, with six a side taking the field at the start of play. Free substitutions were permitted on the fly at the substituting team’s own risk. Most fouls committed would result in a two-minute, sending-off penalty being assessed to the offending player, which would also give the opposition a hockey-style power play. The offending player’s team would play short handed for two minutes or until the other team scored a goal –whichever occurred first. As there were no assistant referees, the standard offside rules of soccer did not apply to hoc-soc. This caused many at the time to predict that the scoring would be much higher than that of a conventional match.
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