Twenty-eight seconds, The crowd is going insane. Kharlamov shooting it into the American end again. Morrow is back there. Now Johnson 19 seconds. Johnson over to Ramsey. Bilyaletdinov gets checked by Ramsey. Mcclanahan is there the puck is still loose. 11 seconds, you've got 10 seconds, the countdown going on right now. Morrow up to Silk. 5 seconds left in the game. The game is over. Do you believe in miracles?! Yes! Unbelievable! The hockey game between the Soviets and the United States that was played was much more than just game.
The US and the Soviets were trying to show their dominance to each other, and this lead to the cold war. According to Trueman, there are three kinds of war. Cold, Warm and Hot. Hot is when the two armies are fighting, while warm is where the countries are trying to find peace, but the armies are strategizing and getting ready to fight. Lastly, cold war is where the two sides never go to war they just stand up for their beliefs. The Cold War consisted of many events for these two countries to show their superiority.

Here our some major events of the cold war. According to Trueman, One event was known as the space race. The space race was about getting things into space and exploring it. The Soviets had an early lead by launching the satellite Sputnik into orbit which was the first manmade object be launched into space. However, the Americans took it by sending men to the moon on the Apollo 11 mission. Another issue was the wars in Vietnam and Afghanistan because the Soviets and the United States had very different beliefs, so the Soviets would stand for one side and the US the other. For example in Vietnam, the US fought for South Vietnam because they were not communist and did not them to get taken over by the communist North. The Soviets were communists so they were supporting North Vietnam in the war. Another major event was the arms race. The arms race was two high military countries that were starting to explore the power of nuclear warfare, and a lot of controversy was created in the Cuban missile crisis that was a part of the arms race. The reason for catastrophe was because the Soviets supported the Cubans. So when the Americans started boycotting Cuban sugar, which was a major part of their economy. The Soviets kept buying it to keep Cuba going so they could put a nuclear warfare plant in Cuba, and that is exactly what they did. Putting them in close striking range of the US. Eventually, United States spy planes discovered the nuclear base and took action. After extensive discussion between Soviet and US officials, the Soviets withdrew all of their missiles from Cuba, so the United States won the arms race. Another controversial moment in the cold war was the 1980 Olympics when the Soviets finally had the chance to show their dominance and superiority. At the time where they were in the heart of the cold war. Their opportunity would come in the semi-final round of the Olympics. However, with this big of a game, there has to be more of a backstory to the two teams.

This is Team USA’s journey to the Olympics. According to Adams, the Soviets had won every Olympics going back to the year 1960 when the US won last, and outscored their opponents 175-44. That is domination. They also did beat the 20 future hall of famer NHL All-Star team 6-0 with their backup goalie in the net. Herb Brooks the chosen leader of the United States hockey team made the final cut of the 1960 team as a player and got beat out by someone new they found so he did not make the team. He later played in the 1964 and 1968 Olympics and then moved onto coaching. He went to the University of Minnesota and turned them from one of the worst teams in the nation to go on and win three national championships with them in seven years. Herb was then named as the national team coach. His methods were questionable, but he formed great teams. He soon hosted a tryout. His method of picking was not about their skill it was about how well they worked together. He eventually whittled it down to a 20 player roster and almost all the players were from the University of Minnesota or Boston University, two programs that hated each other. All the players were amateurs because of the rule that no professionals could play on the national team. Even though the Soviet players practiced three times a day for 11 months out of the year. Minnesota and Boston played each other earlier that year in the college semi-finals, and there was a fight before the game even started that postponed the start time one hour. Practice would eventually start, and there would be fight after fight that would break out. Herb said that I am going to be your coach not your friend. Throughout the next half-year Herb would put the team through the most intense training possibly in sports history. Through all of this Herb would not let players do interviews because he was all about the team not about themselves. Every once in awhile Herb would ask the players who you play for, and they would say something like this, Mike Eruzione, Boston University. That brought up one of the most famous moments in the hockey team's history. After one of the 60 exhibition games they played, against Norway he decided that they were not skating hard enough in the game so they would stay after the game and skate. While the players were going off the ice Herb said, “get back on the ice.” They slowly made their way to the goal line and were going to skate which what they called Herbies which was goal line to blue line and back, then to center line and back, then to the other blue line and back, and then to the other goal line and back. Every time he blew the whistle they had to go. The whistle kept blowing and they kept skating. They were so exhausted. They were going for so long that the janitor said that he was going to turn the lights off on them. Herb replied with, “just give me the keys and I will close it down.” The janitor responded by turning off the lights. There they skated in pure exhaustion skating and skating some more. Mike Eruzione, the captain stood up and said, “Mike Eruzione, and I play for team USA.” They were done with the skating and got off the ice. After the gold medal game, Mike Eruzione would never play another hockey game in his career however there were 13 players that went on to play in the NHL. The New York Times did a study in this team's’ chance to win the gold at the start of the olympics, and it was 1000 to 1. These College kids would change this nation forever. Now that we have heard about the Americans how did the Soviets get to this point?

The Soviet Union’s journey to the Olympics. According to Bort, The Russian Five was noted as the greatest hockey team ever assembled. They played vs NHL All-Star teams and won handily. Arguably the best hockey player in history, Wayne Gretzky said that they just could not keep up with them and could not compete. Their Starting five goalie and coach consisted of Slava Fetisov and Alexei Kasatonov on defense, Sergei Makarov, Igor Larionov and Vladimir Krutov, their goalie was Vladislav Tretiak and the legendary coach Viktor Tikhonov. Some of these Russians came over to America and played in the NHL later to make the starting lineup for the Detroit Red Wings. They won back-to-back Stanley Cup championships in the years 1997 and 1998. This team is sometimes compared to today's San Antonio Spurs. Because they are not the flashiest, but their teamwork and efficiency is so good that they win games. The Russian team was basically on one mind because they were together for 11 months of the year to practice. These are many things of why they would consider this team unbeatable. They played an NHL all-star team that had 20 future hall of famers. The most hall of famers on an all- star team ever. They beat them in a series 2-1 in dominating fashion. They got together and trained in military barracks for 11 months and trained using methods that no one has ever seen before. They trained 3 times a day and their starting goalie, Vladislav Tretiak admitted that in his 13 year career for the Soviet Union he never took a day off of training even on his wedding day. In Russia, they played bandy which is basically hockey with a ball. But they were one of the few countries that had bandy. So they wanted to learn ice hockey to compete in the Olympics. The inventor wanted to watch film from the champion Canadians. But the leader said no we can’t do that because we would never be better than the best if we have the same strategy as they do. So he created his own style of hockey and training methods that some people may question, but it worked. He got some of his ideas from a ballet group. The teamwork that they had and the way they played the game was amazing. Now of what we know about both teams how did the game go down?

Here is a summary of the game, and how the miracle happened. According to Blount, The game started off with the Americans falling behind early from a goal from Alexei Kasatonov. After a bit later the Americans still trailed 1-0. Buzz Schneider put a goal past the great Tretiak, the Soviet goalkeeper. The game was then tied 1-1 until Sergei Makarov put a goal past Craig to make it 2-1. Craig would improve his play over the rest of the game and end up with 36 saves on 39 shots for the game. Then the period was coming to an end when Dave Christian from 100 ft away from the goal and Tretiak blocked it, then Mark Johnson split the defenders got the rebound and put on past Tretiak to end the first period. At intermission Tikhonov, the coach replaced Tretiak with Myshkin, the backup goalie. He later said this was the worst decision of his coaching career. The Americans had hope with the starting goalie out for the Soviets. Myshkin allowed zero goals in the second and play was dominated by the Soviets who had the only goal of the period coming on a power play from Aleksandr Maltsev to go up 3-2. In the third period, the Americans had a rare power play opportunity that led to a few shots and eventually a Mark Johnson goal that tied it up 3-3. Only a few shifts later Mark Pavelich passed to the US captain Mike Eruzione and he put a slapshot past Myshkin to give the Americans their first lead of the game with 10 minutes left. With the Soviets trailing 4-3 they attacked ferociously. As the minutes wound down, yet the Soviets never pulled their goalie. Mostly because their coach they never practiced this situation of 6-5. That lead to the famous call in the last 30 seconds from Al Michaels and Ken Dryden. 28 seconds, The crowd is going insane. Kharlamov shooting it into the American end again. Morrow is back there. Now Johnson 19 seconds. Johnson over to Ramsey.

Bilyaletdinov gets checked by Ramsey. Mcclanahan is there the puck is still loose. 11 seconds, you've got 10 seconds, the countdown going on right now. Morrow up to Silk. 5 seconds left in the game. The game is over. Do you believe in miracles?! Yes! Unbelievable. As the team ran onto the ice to celebrate the Soviets just stood on their blue line watching the Americans celebrate, and meanwhile, Herb Brooks ran into the locker room and cried. Once the Americans got back into the locker room they broke out singing in unison “God Bless America.” An analyst later compared the victory to a team of Canadian football players beating the Super Bowl Champions. The Americans went on to win the gold medal vs. Finland winning 4-2. After this kind of game and upset what happened to these teams after the game?

After this historic upset, it changed both countries. According to, Wikipedia the Americans won the gold medal after. Out of the 20 players on the team 13 went on to play in the NHL and 5 of them played at least 500 games and 3 of them played at least 1,000 games. Sports Illustrated went on to name this the greatest sports moment of the 20th century. The Americans will be forever remembered. For the Soviets, they ended up winning the silver medal because it was a round robin not an elimination bracket and they only had one loss. Six of the Soviet players joined the NHL and some won championships with the Detroit Red Wings. A movie was made called “Miracle” as well as many documentaries.

The Americans and the Soviets found each other in hockey games over the next years. For the most part, the Soviets won. However, the Soviet Union which consisted of Moldova, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Russia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Ukraine collapsed and the hockey was then just Russia. The United States and Russia met in the 2014 Sochi Olympics. It was a battle the whole game, and could not be decided in 3 periods or overtime. They headed into a penalty shootout. They would go back and forth. Trading make for make, and miss for miss. In round five Russia missed, and T.J. Oshie would make his for the US and they would win. Because of the miracle, this rivalry may stay forever. The miracle on ice because of politics and the cold war was much more than just a game. This game unified a nation.