The Last Warm-up

On this date in 1980, the US Olympic Hockey team, coached by Herb Brooks, played a match at Madison Square Garden, three days before the start of the Olympics.  The match was against the team from the Soviet Union which would represent the USSR in the Olympics at Lake Placid, New York. The United States team would lose this match, in rather convincing fashion, 10 to 3, leading many to conclude that they had little or no chance against the red curtain power houses of the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia.

Soviet Coach Victor Tikhonov

Members of the Soviet team were primarily soldiers within the Red Army.  Of course, their main occupation was not as a soldier, but hockey.  Some teams, like Canada refused to play the Soviets due to the fact that while they may have met the letter of amateurs, they were in fact, professionals. The Soviet team was well renowned as the best team in the world. No training facility matched theirs.  No goal tender could come close to the ones they could put on the ice.  They had power, they had speed, they had skill.  The Soviet program had produced four consecutive gold medal winners in the Olympics from 1964 through 1976.  The 1960 US team would upset the Soviets at Squaw Valley. During this span, the powerful Czechoslovakian team would claim three silver medals, and one bronze.  It would be foolish to think that any team from the west could match up with and play with such juggernauts from behind the Iron Curtain.  

Vladislov Tretiak, was considered the best goal tender in the world

The US team was primarily composed of college students from Minnesota (nine of the twenty played with Brooks at the University of MN), Boston, MA (four played for Boston University), and of course a couple from Wisconsin.  Only one person returned from the 1976 hockey team.  These young men would have competed against each other, but starting the prior July were brought together to form a team.  Animosity was present at first among US team members as college affiliation would, be more important than their intended goal.  The animosity would need to be overcome, and with a hard style of coaching Brooks would see that it was.  As he would say in the movie "Miracle":  "the name on the front is a helluva a lot more important than the name on the back."  With an average age of 21, it was one of the youngest ever US team to play in the Olympics.  it was also the youngest team to play in the 1980 Olympics.  Brooks would introduce a different style of play to these young men, a combination of the North American and European style.  Skills learned during the course of one's life are often difficult to unlearn, but that was what Brooks demanded of his chosen caste.  They may not have been the best, they may not have been the most athletic, but they would come together to undertake a remarkable journey.  Twenty young men who loved to play the game of hockey.

Boris Mikhailov, Soviet team right-wing
Born in 1944.  Contemporary photo.
By contrast most US team members were born a decade or more later

In the movie, during the summer as training began in 1979, the assistant coach asked the trainer if he had ever seen Herb Brooks so hard on the boys who played for him.  The trainer would say, no he had not, but "Herb has a reason for everything he does."  Much to the discontent of the US Amateur Hockey Association Herb Brooks scheduled this game against the Soviets, the last of 61 exhibition games, as a final warm up before the start of Olympic play.  Things did not go well that night for the US team.  Although at least they were not shut out as were NHL all-stars shut out by the same Soviet team.  But, the game had the purpose Brooks desired.  As the Soviet coach would later admit, the game instilled over confidence in his team.  It was a risky move, because it also could have instilled no confidence within his team. One never knows what a situation and opportunity will be presented. One only needs to be prepared to recognize the opportunity and then take advantage of that opportunity.  The 1980 US Olympic Hockey team would do both.  Without this game on February 9, 1980, there would have been no miracle on ice on February 22, 1980.