By Dave Litterer of The US Soccer History Archives, with supplemental materials by Steve Holroyd and Paul Reeths

Once again, 12 teams took to the field for the MISL's ninth season. ESPN's TV schedule was expanded to 18 games. As in the previous season, the Western Division race was a blowout, but this time it was the Tacoma Stars that took the prize, beating the vastly improved Kansas City Comets for the title. In the East, Cleveland again took the top spot, beating out the Baltimore Blast by a game. Dallas, Minnesota and Chicago finished a comfortable distance behind. The New York experiment was a widespread failure. After winning only 3 of their 26 games, the team folded in mid-season.

The end of the season saw Cleveland and Tacoma win their respective division titles, and advance to the semifinals despite rough quarterfinal series against Minnesota and Wichita. San Diego and Dallas upset their quarterfinal rivals, beating Kansas City and Baltimore respectively. The upsets continued in the semifinals, as the favored Cleveland Force fell to Dallas in four. Tacoma prevailed in the other series, but took the full seven games to fend off tenacious San Diego. The championship series was one of the most exciting series in league history. Yet another comeback story, Tacoma fell behind early, losing to Dallas 4-10 and 4-7, before taking the next two 5-3 and 6-5. Game 5, held in tacoma broke the MISL attendance record as 20,284 fans flocked to the Tacoma Dome to see the Stars defeat Dallas 5-3. Game six was played before a packed house at Reunion Arena in Dallas, where 16,824 witnessed the longest game in MISL playoff history. It went eighty and a half minutes before the Sidekicks finally defeated Tacoma 5-4. In the final game, back at Tacoma, an indoor soccer record crowd of 21,728 packed the Tacoma Dome only to see Dallas win the league championship with a 4-3 overtime victory over the Stars, on June 20.

For the first time in recent history, Steve Zungul did not take the top scoring title, which instead went to Tatu of the Sidekicks. However, Zungul did become the first MISL player to break the 1,000 point mark. This year, the MISL sponsored a tour by Dynamo Moscow, which played six games against MISL opponents, with the MISL teams winning all six games, one in overtime. The games were popular, with attendance ranging from 8,000 to almost 13,000, and inspiring a similar series two years later.

Two worrisome developments nagged the MISL. First was the continuing slide of the St. Louis Steamers, formerly a flagship franchise which had regularly paced the league in attendance and led the way with innovative promotional events. The second was the continuing poor performance of the Los Angeles Lazers who again finished last in the West, despite being in one of the league's largest markets. At this point, the three top metropolitan areas featured a folded team and two teams at the bottom of their divisions. In addition, the league champion Dallas Sidekicks had briefly folded before the season began, only to be saved by new ownership at the last second. The league faced other challenges as well. The AISA, buoyed by its first successes, expanded into new territories and began to raid the MISL for players, leading to the start of a salary war. Feeling the pinch, the Minnesota Strikers received permission to suspend operations for 1987-88 to reorganize their finances through a "save the Strikers" campaign. The effort proved successful and the team returned for the following season after all.

Before the season, New York was reactivated and changed its name to Express.

During the season, New York folded.

All-Star Game:  Eastern Division defeated Western Division 6-5 in overtime.
(at Los Angeles.  Att:  15,893.  MVP:  Kai Haaskivi)

Leading Scorers                    GP   G   A   TP
Tatu, Dallas                      51  73  38  111
Jai Goossens, kansas City         45  51  44   95
Kai Haaskivi, Cleveland           49  34  55   89
Steve Zyngul, Tacoma              51  42  47   89
Preki, Tacoma                     51  41  47   88
Chico Borja, Wichita              46  51  36   87
Batata, Chicago                   52  37  48   85
Godfrey Ingram, Tacoma            51  52  29   81
Dale Mitchell, Kansas City        48  51  24   75
Branko Segota, San Diego          38  34  41   75
Carl Valentine, Cleveland         52  33  39   72
Gary Heale, Tacoma                52  46  24   70
Drago, Chicago/Baltimore          50  34  30   64
Damir Haramina, Kansas City       45  42  22   64
Karl-Heinz Granitza, Chicago      38  35  28   63
Pato Margetic, Kansas City        46  25  37   62
Richard Chinapoo, Baltimore       40  40  21   61

LEADING GOALKEEPERS   (Min. 1250 minutes to qualify)

                              GP    Min. Sho  Svs   GA   W-L   GAA
Tino Lettieri, Minnesota     35  2058   839  392  116  15-19  3.38
Krys Soboeski, Dallas        43  2525  1010  464  145  24-19  3.45
Scott Manning, Baltimore     24  1314   554  280   78   14-9  3.47
Zoltan Toth, San Diego       33  1875   720  364  110  17-13  3.52
Jim Gorsek, San Diego        25  1265   489  259   82  10-12  3.89
Keith Van Eron, Baltimore    26  1390   688  330   91   15-6  3.93
Joe Pacaleo, Tacoma          31  1808   924  360  120   22-9  3.98
Slobo Ilijevski, St. Louis   46  2631  1150  627  176  16-28  4.01
Chris Vaccaro, Cleveland     29  1731   791  342  116   20-9  4.02
P. J. Johns, Cleveland       24  1406   690  331   95   14-8  4.05
David Brcic, Los Angeles     39  2304  1028  508  160  14-25  4.17
Alan Mayer, Kansas City      39  2307  1144  562  161  22-16  4.19
 
Most Valuable Player:  Tatu, Dallas Sidekicks
Coach of the Year:  David Clements, Kansas City
MISL Scoring Champion:  Tatu, Dallas Sidekicks
MISL Pass Master (most Assists):  Kai Haaskivi, Cleveland Force
Defender of the Year:  Bruce Savage, Baltimore Blast
Goalkeeper of the Year:  Tino Lettieri, Minnesota Strikers
Rookie of the Year:  John Stollmayer, Cleveland Force
Newcomer of the Year:  Steve Kinsey, Minnesota Strikers
Championship Series Player of the Year:  Tatu, Dallas Sidekicks

All-MISL team:

G - Kyle Sobieski, Dallas Sidekicks
D - Bruce savage, Baltimore Blast
D - Kevin Crow, San Diego Sockers
M - Kai Haaskivi, Cleveland Force
F - Tatu, Dallas Sidekicks
F - Steve Zungul, Tacoma Stars