"Looking back, the 1980 Miracle on Ice' was much more than an Olympic upset, more than the underdogs defeating the favorite in a hockey game. I t was that these unknown, working-class American young men had defeated the all powerful, seasoned Soviet professional team who, months earlier, conquered a team of NHL All-Stars in the 1979 Challenge C up. The upset came at an auspicious time as the decade that preceded that moment in our nation’s history truly had tested the character of our country. To many Americans, that game was not only a physical victory, but an ideological, even spiritual triumph—perhaps even a success as meaningful in its own nuanced way as the Berlin Airlift or the Apollo moon landing."

- from the Afterword by President Jimmy Carter

"It’s been often chronicled that the collective mood of our nation in early 1980 bordered on a combination of gloom and anxiety...Out of that darkening vortex came a group of relatively unknown young men and a coach whose focus was limited to performing at the highest level possible over a February fortnight in Lake Placid, New York. When it was over—and the 1980 United States Olympic H ockey Team had won the gold medal—it was a sports upset of historic proportions. But as anyone old enough to remember knows, it broke through barriers far apart from the worlds of hockey and athletics. It gave our country a collective emotional lift and it came out of nowhere. Three decades later, people still light up at the memories..."

- from the Introduction by Al Michaels