Everyone remembers the “Miracle on Ice,” the night the U.S. Olympic hockey team beat the heavily-favored USSR in the 1980 Winter Games. The 29th anniversary of that game passed on Sunday, but today is an anniversary just as or even more important.
On Feb. 24, 1980, the U.S. rallied from a 2-1 deficit after two periods to beat Finland 4-2 and clinch the gold medal. The game against the Soviets was merely the first in the final round-robin (the U.S. game against Sweden from the preliminaries carried over). Herb Brooks‘ team needed to knock off the Finnish team to guarantee the championship.
So while Mike Eruzione gets so much (deserved) praise for his game-winning goal against the Soviets, remember that Phil Verchota, Rob McClanahan and Mark Johnson (who had two goals in the Miracle on Ice game) found the net as the U.S. stormed back to beat Finland.
That led to the scene later in the day when Eruzione stood proudly on the podium and called his teammates up to join him to celebrate the greatest upset in sports history. That image ranks in my mind alongside the famous picture as Eruzione’s winning goal in the USSR game hit the net.
I was 11 when all this happened, right in the middle of that special sports fanaticism of youth. I devoured everything I could learn about the team. The arrival of cable TV in our house a year or so earlier sparked my interest in hockey, and near-constant playing of Strat-o-Matic‘s new hockey game fanned the flame.
Then came the improbable Olympic run. Everything seemed to align perfectly. The games were in the U.S. so they played live at a normal time of day. The cold and snow at Lake Placid made for a perfect Winter Olympic setting. You could watch Eric Heiden kick butt outside in the afternoon, then catch another come-from-behind win by Brooks’ team in the evening.
I remember exactly where I was on that Sunday morning when Finland went down. My parents had some sort of brunch party. I don’t remember the occasion. The game started at 11 a.m., I believe. We had purchased a VCR the year before and had the game taping, but I couldn’t go without watching. I remember kneeling in front of the set in our downstairs family room, adults milling around me, as the final seconds ticked off the clock.
The miracle was complete. Even then, I knew nothing like this would never happen again. I didn’t know that pros would invade the Olympics and we would talk more about Winstrol and HGH instead of power plays and world records. I just knew that those 20 guys set the bar too high.
Next year will be nuts with the 30th anniversary. I only hope that someone takes One Goal, the definitive book about the the creation and success of this team, and re-publishes it. Sadly, you need to pay a pretty penny to get a used version. And I’m not parting with mine.
Same here, Bill. The book is awesome because one of the authors is Art Kaminsky, who was the agent for most of the players. He had very close access to Brooks as part of a truce they called so Kaminsky wouldn’t try to convince players to quit the Olympic team and go pro.
The great stuff are the mind games Herb played, especially how he shuttled players in and out of the team during their training to keep everyone on their toes. He even had Jim Craig convinced after the Russians killed them in that exhibition game that he would be benched for the Olympics.
If someone told me I could be on any one team in my life, this hockey team would be it.
I’d love to get a copy of that book someday. I’ll keep checking. Hard to believe all this time has passed. Seems like yesterday this happened. Damn, still get chills.
I totally forgot about that.
“If you lose this game, you will take it to your f—ng grave. To your f—ing grave.”
Best. Pep. Talk. Ever.