Large market teams began offering big contracts to aging foreign superstars such as Pelé and Johan Cruyff, and the Lancers struggled to keep up with the rest of the league economically or on the field.

These two factions of ownership fell into disputes in 1980 that landed in court, and the organization racked up debts owed to both players and the league.

[3][4] The 1981 Flash was led by coach Don Lalka and put together a roster that featured several players moonlighting from the Major Indoor Soccer League's Buffalo Stallions in addition to the three holdovers from the Lancers.

The Flash qualified for the playoffs but had to go on the road for the one game play-in round, where they were eliminated 2-0 by the eventual league champion Carolina Lightnin'.

This was a status that most ASL clubs who chose it never came back from, but the Flash would defy the odds and announced their intention to field a team again in 1984.

However, the ASL was collapsing that winter after a long period of instability and decline, and the Flash would have to pivot to mount their comeback with a new organization, the United Soccer League.

[4] The USL was created in early 1984 by the owners of the Jacksonville Tea Men and Dallas Americans in an attempt to correct what they saw as fundamental flaws in the ASL's power structure and to give teams a better chance to succeed financially.

The Flash also did not tap into the pool of players that had recently found themselves squeezed out of the shrinking NASL (which had contracted from twenty-four teams in 1980 to nine in 1984).

[3] The relatively inexperienced Flash had a hard time keeping pace with the rest of the teams in the USL, most of whom had at least a few players on their rosters with experience overseas and/or in the NASL or MISL.