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A golden moment Remembering the 'Miracle on ice'
Posted: Tuesday February 22, 2000 09:18 PM
By Jim Huber, CNNSI.com LAKE PLACID, N.Y. -- It may just be the single most indelible moment in all of U.S. sports history. One that sent an entire nation into a frenzy. Even now, two decades later, it remains as clear as if it were yesterday. Against such incredible odds, the Americans went about winning the 1980 Olympic hockey gold medal. And with that most of them became instant heroes. But like all team sports, some were much larger than others. "I deal with it a lot more, I think than most of my teammates do," said Mike Eruzione, the stocky captain. "After the Olympic Games they went on, they had NHL careers and got involved with businesses. For 20 years I've still been doing things because of what happened to me in 1980." Therein lies the biggest difference between the team's most famous player and its most anonymous. For a while, Eruzione achieved folk-hero status by scoring the game-winning goal against the seemingly invincible Soviets on February 22, 1980. Backup goaltender Steve Janaszak was the only player on any team in that Olympic tournament who didn't see even a second's worth of ice time. "Yeah, a lot of people don't even know I was there, which is just fine," Janaszak admits now. "That's what I tell people. I had the best seat in the house there, timing the shifts for [head coach] Herb [Brooks.] And making sure I don't spill my tea." Janaszak took his regular turn between the pipes during the pre-season and exhibition games, but once Team USA got to Lake Placid, he was relegated to the bench by the stellar play of Jim Craig. It was a move he fully understood.
"He played phenomenal goal," Janaszak remembers of Craig's play in front of the net. "You don't mess with that." Once he did find his way on to the ice to celebrate, Janaszak managed to also find his way into posterity. "I've been accused of knowing where the cameras were," he said with a laugh as he held up the original game jersey with his name on the back. "But yeah, the name shows up and it's reasonably recognized in a lot of photographs that came out of this, which is kind of funny." Two decades later, Janaszak is still on top of the world, working on the 85th floor of the World Trade Center in New York City for an investment banking firm. Though like his Olympic experience, he continues in relative obscurity, having long since traded his goalie pads for a mouse pad. His historic achievement rarely comes up. "There are people that I've dealt with for years that have no idea that this is part of my background and then they find out and again, they've got the answer to a great trivia question that they never lose on," Janaszak said. The past 20 years have been exactly the opposite for Mike Eruzione, who can't go two days without somebody mentioning the "Miracle on Ice." He splits his time these days between hockey-related television gigs, speaking engagements, his job as the director of alumni relations at his alma mater, Boston University, and various businesses he's involved with. All that on top of helping out his oldest son Mike's high school hockey team. And no matter who he meets on his various endeavors, be they fan, celebrities like NHL Hall of Famers or presidents as in Bush, everyone it seems has seen that goal.
And the only one who hasn't? Eruzione. He's never watched his tape of the victory over the Russians. "Maybe I have to sit with a psychologist or something to figure it out, but I've got all the tapes in the cabinet of every game and never watch it," he said. It's not like Eruzione avoids his Olympic memories. Trinkets and trophies are displayed prominently in his office and home. It's the tangible artifacts, particularly the gold medal, that often unleash a flood of memories for Eruzione and for Janaszak, and remind them both of the impact their team's victory had on their country. "We weren't in a very good situation as a country at that time," Eruzione recalls of 1980. "Inflation was absurd, people were waiting in line to get gasoline, hostages were held in Iran, and the Soviets had invaded Afghanistan." That, says Janaszak, is when he and his teammates came to the rescue. "And all of a sudden you had this little tiny glimmer of hope in what was presented incorrectly as kind of this group of college guys who happened to jump in a car together and ended up in Lake Placid, OK?," he sais. "Which wasn't how it was, but that's how a lot of America saw this, playing against the big, bad professional Russians. And we beat them." It remains one of those defining moments for most if not all Americans.
"The first time you meet someone, they've got to tell you where they were," Eruzione said. "They'll say, 'Let me tell you a funny story. You'll never guess where I was when you guys,'" and his voice trails off. "And I've heard them all and they're great." Janaszak tells of one such story that shows to what depths some Americans literally went to spread the good news. Or the bad news depending on where you were. "And I'm hearing stories about guys in ships at sea wiring the Russian submarines that they're tracking around and saying, 'Ha-ha, we beat you guys,'" Janaszak said. Over the years the teammates have reunited regularly, whether for a photo shoot or a ceremony. And this group of doctors, coaches and businessmen instantly revert back to the all-American boys next door they were when they charmed an entire nation. "The insults start right away," cracks Eruzione. "Who's fat? Who's got no hair? Who's divorced? Who doesn't have a good job? What a stupid tie you have on! I can't believe you wore those shoes?" And amidst all the accolades and honors that have followed them through the years, the simple fact remains that these men have not lost sight of who they were, or who they represented. "We're ready to walk on the stage at the Sports Illustrated presentation for the greatest sporting event in the 20th Century, and [teammate Bill Baker] 'Bakes' turns around and says, 'Well, we get to be fake-important again one more time 20 years later.'" The importance is undeniable, if only because of the way a hockey game continues to impact the lives of the people who played in it and the nation that looked on in awe. And the importance lies, not so much in the line score, as in the lesson as Janaszak says he learned from the experience. "The gold medal to me is living proof that miracles do happen and possible dreams do come true," he said.
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