Mesa High has played a significant part in state athletics with its long history and tradition. Football, basketball and wrestling have been highly successful sports to name a few.

A sport to be honored Tuesday night is one the school helped play a role in inaugurating in the state three decades ago  -- boys soccer.

"Mesa High played a part in getting soccer going as an AIA sport in 1980-81 ," current Mesa boys soccer coach T.J. Hagen said. "I'm not sure many people know that. Steve Ramos was Mesa's coach that year. He and some others were instrumental in getting the AIA board to approve a 10-game schedule the first year. Mesa finished with the best record of the teams playing that year. They were 8-1-1. They were unofficially the first state champion."

Ramos, who coached Mesa's first team and the boys team at Mesa for 10 years, said the idea for starting soccer at Mesa High came from students in Mesa High's German Club in the late 1970s. Many of those students grew up in Air Force families stationed in Germany and had played soccer while residing there.

"That got a few of us thinking and we put together what was called the Tri-City Soccer League (Mesa, Tempe and Scottsdale)," Ramos said. "Domenic Scafaria (Mountain View), Ron Cole (Westwood), Bob Kastelic (Saguaro) and myself were the ones that pursued it. We talked with (assistant superintendent) Dave Eagleburger and (district athletic director) Lionel Goar. They were able to allocate about $6,000 to get uniforms, balls and equipment."

Hagen, who played for Mesa in the late 1980s and graduated from the school in 1991, has been part of Jackrabbits soccer for more than 20 of the 30 years of its AIA existence. He thought the sport important enough to begin a Hall of Fame specifically for soccer at Mesa. It's been determined the first honoree in  Mesa High's Soccer Hall of Fame will be the 1980-81 team. The induction will take place Jan. 25 at halftime of the Jackrabbits' match with Hamilton.

"Just by a quirk of scheduling the very first AIA sanctioned soccer game was played at Mesa," Ramos, who is still involved with soccer at the school as its announcer, said. "That's something I won't forget."

Mesa and Mountain View played that first game and Mesa won, 1-0. The 1980-81 Jackrabbits were not awarded a trophy or a place in the record books because the AIA didn't set up playoffs or a championship that year. The title has always been unofficial, but the team was recognized later in the school year by the Mesa school board as the state champs albeit unofficial.

Many of the players and the stat keepers (girls who played on the team when it was a club team) from the squad have been located and plan on attending the ceremony. Hagen believes it fitting to have that team honored first rather than an individual given the circumstances surrounding that initial squad and their part in getting AIA sanctioned soccer in the schools.

Members of the team are Joe Baca, Danny Cugudda, Kevin Domenico, Val Faustini, Richard Gallegos, Chris Holbrook, Shahin Movafagh Mowzoon, Kathy Dock, Eric Ostrander, Mark Ostrander, Tim Stanton, Shaun Stirland, Harvey Thacker, Toralf Tronstad, Greg Turley and Lynn LeSueur. Coaches are Ramos and Richard Bird.

"We were mythical state champions," Ramos said. "The Mesa school board took the time to honor the team. So if we have a Hall of Fame they should be the first to be in it."