“I’m not looking for the best players. I’m looking for the right ones.”
– Herb Brooks
Herb Brooks was the coach of the 1980 US Olympic Hockey Team that defeated the Russians
by Tom Scheck, Minnesota Public Radio
August 11, 2003Forest Lake, Minn. — Herb Brooks stood behind the bench during one of the most famous sporting events in American history. It was 1980. The United States was in the midst of the Cold War. There was an energy crisis and daily updates about the hostage situation in Iran. And Brooks convinced a rag tag group of college hockey players that they could beat the powerful Soviets. It was the kind of event where people remember exactly where they were when they heard the news of the upset.
"I was standing at a blue line at Munn Arena in East Lansing, Michigan when I was at Notre Dame. We were playing Michigan State. It was a Friday Night," recalls University of Minnesota men's hockey coach Don Lucia. "Right before the national anthem they made the announcement that the United States had beaten Russia. It was total disbelief from everybody including my teammates because nobody gave the U.S. a chance. That was, without question, the greatest upset in the history of sport. It's something that has never been duplicated since and will never be duplicated again."
