By Michael Lewis

FrontRowSoccer.com Editor

No one realized it at the time, but the 1982 Soccer Bowl was going to be the last hurrah for the Cosmos and that they would have to wait almost three decades before they would return to the North American Soccer League championship game in 2013.

They certainly proved to be a formidable side, accruing more points than anyone else during the regular season with a 23-9 record and 203 points to capture the Eastern Division crown. Today, Sept. 18, is the 39th anniversary of the 1982 final.

Giorgio Chinaglia won the scoring title on the strength of his 20 goals and 15 assists for 55 points.

Steve Moyers (13 goals, nine assists), Steve Hunt (nine goals, 15 assists), Roberto Cabanas (seven goals) and Vladislav Bogicevic (four goals, 24 assists) played vital roles on the attacking end with the likes of goalkeeper Hubert Birkenmeier, defenders Andranik Eskandarian, Jeff Durgan and Robert Iarusci, and midfielders Johan Neeskens, J.C. Romero and Rick Davis forming a solid supporting cast.

The path to Soccer Bowl was not all smooth.

Guided by Prof. Julio Mazzei, the Cosmos needed three games to dispose of the Tulsa Roughnecks in the opening round of the playoffs. After romping to a 5-0 triumph in the opener behind Chinaglia’s two goals at home, they dropped the road match, 1-0, before Hunt tallied the lone goal in a 1-0 home win.

They then dispatched the San Diego Sockers, who were to host the 1982 Soccer Bowl in southern California, by a pair of 2-1 results, with Cabanas scoring in each encounter, and Durgan in the first game and Chinaglia in the clincher.

That set up a rematch of the 1977 Soccer Bowl between the Cosmos and the Seattle Sounders.

In this confrontation, however, the Sounders took the game to the Cosmos as they enjoyed the early run of play but could not capitalize before a crowd of 22,634.

“We could have won the game by halftime,” Seattle head coach Alan Hinton told Soccer America. “It’s very disappointing. You have to take what the Cosmos give you, which we did not. Their goal was totally against the grain of play. We played a terrific game in the first half and they us wore us down in the second half.”

The Cosmos found the back of the net at 30:17. Romero kicked the ball toward the Seattle penalty area. Chinaglia screened off defender Benny Dargle and caught up to the ball at the top of the penalty area. Chinaglia blasted a hard right-footed shot and whipped it into the far corner for what turned out to be the lone goal of the match at Jack Murphy Stadium.

“What can I say?” Chinaglia said. “I am paid to score goals. As soon as I got the ball, I knew I was going to score. I was in good position and as soon as I hit the ball, I knew it was a goal.”

The Cosmos held on for a win.

In 1977, they defeated the Sounders by a goal, 2-1, in Pele’s final competitive match.

Five years later, they won for another Brazilian legend — central defender Carlos Alberto, playing in his last competitive game.

“It was a special game, my last official one, but emotionally I felt about the same before,” Alberto told this writer. “I was worried, and I smoked a lot of cigarettes today. I wanted to be a champion again. … I am very happy now and that’s not because I’m stopping play, but because we won.”

While Alberto was talking to reporters, a makeshift samba band — composed of Cosmos players, onlookers and fanatics chanted the names of the players to the music of Jose Marti’s “Guantanamera.”

The samba started with Alberto, went to Hunt, then to Davis before serenading Birkenmeier.

Birkenmeier did not appear to be in a celebratory mood/ He had registered his third consecutive Soccer Bowl shutout — the others being Fort Lauderdale (1980) and Chicago Fire (1981) and he extended his personal Soccer Bowl shutout streak to 285 minutes.

“I dedicated this game to my mother when she died in August,” Birkenmeier told this writer. “I promised we would win the Soccer Bowl for her.”

Birkenmeier and his Cosmos teammates came through for his mother with their fifth NASL crown.

Above the masthead of the Sept. 23, 1982 edition of Soccer America. the headline said it all:

Cosmos Are Back as No. 1!

Front Row Soccer editor Michael Lewis has covered 13 World Cups (eight men, five women), seven Olympics and 25 MLS Cups. He has written about New York City FC, New York Cosmos, the New York Red Bulls and both U.S. national teams for Newsday and has penned a soccer history column for the Guardian.com. Lewis, who has been honored by the Press Club of Long Island and National Soccer Coaches Association of America, is the former editor of BigAppleSoccer.com. He has written seven books about the beautiful game and has published ALIVE AND KICKING The incredible but true story of the Rochester Lancers. It is available at Amazon.com.