IsOC 

 
The Nautilus National League Story

Cliff Underwood Remembers

 

In 1985, interest in playing competitive Octopush had reached a peak, with many local leagues and various tournaments being played at Club level, but at that time only one National Event, admitted now split into Quarter-Finals, Semi-Finals and Finals were being played by the BOA membership at various UK locations.

This didn’t seem to be enough to Ian Pearson of the Islington Club, the BOA Chairman at that time, consequently, he decided to something about it.  As he Had successfully organised a London Championship, being played by four Divisions in four one day events at various locations, Ian decided to put together plans for a National League, using the successful London League as his Model.

Using his influence with London Diving company and Dive equipment shop, Collins and Chambers, Ian persuade them to sponsor the new National League, with the League adopting the sponsoring Company’s logo, the Nautilus, as the figurehead for the new league.  Thus the Nautilus National League was born.

Initially, the plan was to hold the League matches twice a year, once in the Autumn and again in the spring, with six teams to a division and two teams being relegated and two teams promoted from each division after each event.

The following Autumn, 1986, the new League got underway with nominally 25 teams in four divisions, unfortunately, five teams dropped out at the last minute, leaving just 20 teams to compete for the first events.

Despite this minor hick-up, the teams which did compete, voted the event a great success, much to Ian’s relief.

This was followed up in Spring 1987 with 30 teams taking part in five divisions, with only two pulling out, leaving 28 very satisfied teams to take part.  The following autumn of 1987 saw some mixed fortunes, with the top two divisions well attended, but the lower three, not so good, the fifth division not taking place at all.  When questioned, the teams who had pulled out, stated that the spring round ”interfered” with their preparations for the National Championship. All of which convinced Ian to call off the spring 1998 round, leaving the formula we see today, with the Nautilus National League taking place in the autumn, usually in November and the National Championship is taking place in spring to early summer.

At the time of writing this account, 2011,  the five divisions of the League had 33 teams, plus two International Guest teams taking part.  I think we can safely sum up, that Ian Pearson’s idea for a National League is a great success.

Updated by Phil Thompson on 30/11/11