The 1st Ice Hockey game played in Southern California was on May 13, 1916 in San Diego, on the ice rink at the Panama-California International Exposition (in the former Alhambra Cafeteria building).

The group of men who lined up for that game was composed of a local sportsman, an aviator from the Government aviation school, two men from the United States Marine Corps, a concessionaire from the Isthmus, a map maker, a physician, a army officer and several prominent business men. They were men from Canada, from Europe and from Eastern & Northern States, and they had played ice Hockey from Nova Scotia to China. They called themselves the Exposition and San Diego teams.