Ice Hockey · 1980 · Lake Placid, USA
The Miracle on Ice
At the height of the Cold War, a roster of American college amateurs takes on a Soviet side that had turned Olympic hockey into a formality, and wins.
USA 4-3 USSR
Final score
Olympic medal round
Round
~21
Team average age
The Soviet Union had won five of the previous six Olympic golds and had lately beaten a team of NHL All-Stars for good measure. Herb Brooks built the American side at Lake Placid out of college players, assembled and drilled over months, average age barely twenty.
In the medal round on 22 February 1980 the United States fell behind twice. Mark Johnson levelled it again just before the second intermission, and Mike Eruzione put them ahead with exactly ten minutes left. Al Michaels called the last seconds down on American television and asked, 'Do you believe in miracles? Yes!', which is the part most people can still quote.
The result did not actually win anything yet, since the Americans had to beat Finland two days later to take the gold. The Soviet game is the one that lodged in the culture regardless. Played weeks after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, with the Cold War at full volume, it was read from the first whistle as being about a good deal more than hockey.
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