ESPN Classic!!

Falconfreak90 · Post by **Falconfreak90** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 11:43 am

Tonight at 8pm and 11:30, ESPN Classic is rebroadcasting the 1980 USA/USSR Olympic hockey game....almost in its entirety! Thursday night at 8pm, ESPN Classic will rebroadcast the Gold medal game between the USA and Finland in an edited 2 hour format. 25 years ago....still gives me tons of goosebumps watching history unfold as a 12 year old kid.

I am getting tape ready to roll for these events....

USA! USA! USA!

Bleeding Orange · Post by **Bleeding Orange** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 11:47 am

Dammit Freak! I thought you were going to say that they were going to be showing our 1984 NC!!!!!

DON'T DO THAT TO ME!!!!!!

Seriously, though, ESPN just showed the game (I'm assuming in the same format) on Sunday. It was pretty cool. They even included some of the post-game coverage which included interviews with Eruzione and Craig. I definately reccomend watching it twice! I will be doing so tonight!

Falconfreak90 · Post by **Falconfreak90** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 12:29 pm

Sorry, Bro! I saw it in the paper today and got a little carried away.

Guess I'm a few days behind everyone else....kids do that to ya.

GO HOCKEY!! BEAT MSU!!

NY-BG-FAN · Post by **NY-BG-FAN** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 2:06 pm

How about a mention for Ken Morrow and Mark Wells.....the two BGSU Alumni on the team? Wells was more of a reserve, but Morrow was a huge part of that team. I wish Morrow had had more of a role in the movie, he really made a difference.

BGFalcons232 · Post by **BGFalcons232** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 2:43 pm

Bleeding Orange wrote:Dammit Freak! I thought you were going to say that they were going to be showing our 1984 NC!!!!! DON'T DO THAT TO ME!!!!!!

Seriously, though, ESPN just showed the game (I'm assuming in the same format) on Sunday. It was pretty cool. They even included some of the post-game coverage which included interviews with Eruzione and Craig. I definately reccomend watching it twice! I will be doing so tonight!

sunday's version was the edited one. ESPN Classic has two and half hours dedicated to broadcasting the game tonight, so i think it's going to be the full version of the game, uncut. also, before each broadcast of the game, ESPN will be reairing the special they did about the 1980 team for ESPN's 25th anniversary last year.

TG1996 · Post by **TG1996** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 2:55 pm

Around Christmas time, I found a copy of HBO's documentary on the Miracle on Ice at Target for about $10. Its VERY well done, brings a tear to the eye every time. Well worth trying to pick it up, especially if you didn't see it when it ran on HBO originally.

Falconfreak90 · Post by **Falconfreak90** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 3:05 pm

TG1996 wrote:Around Christmas time, I found a copy of HBO's documentary on the Miracle on Ice at Target for about $10. Its VERY well done, brings a tear to the eye every time. Well worth trying to pick it up, especially if you didn't see it when it ran on HBO originally.

TG,
Someone gave that to me for Christmas on VHS....excellent stuff.

Bleeding Orange · Post by **Bleeding Orange** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 8:09 pm

NY-BG-FAN wrote:How about a mention for Ken Morrow and Mark Wells.....the two BGSU Alumni on the team? Wells was more of a reserve, but Morrow was a huge part of that team. I wish Morrow had had more of a role in the movie, he really made a difference.

I think to have focused at all on Morrow would have taken away from the Minnesota/BC rivalry that Disney felt the need to obsess over throughout the movie. Its a great movie, but I thought they really over-did this part. I'm talking love-triangle-in-Pearl Harbor overdone. Its just one more reason that Disney sucks a** and is the earthly corporate embodiment of Satan.

I was thoroughly pissed off when they didn't introduce Morrow in that player introduction scene when they said their names and the school they played for. I think I would have wet my pants to hear "Bowling Green" in a movie that big. F*cking Disney.

NY-BG-FAN · Post by **NY-BG-FAN** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 9:29 pm

Bleeding Orange wrote:
NY-BG-FAN wrote:How about a mention for Ken Morrow and Mark Wells.....the two BGSU Alumni on the team? Wells was more of a reserve, but Morrow was a huge part of that team. I wish Morrow had had more of a role in the movie, he really made a difference.
I think to have focused at all on Morrow would have taken away from the Minnesota/BC rivalry that Disney felt the need to obsess over throughout the movie. Its a great movie, but I thought they really over-did this part. I'm talking love-triangle-in-Pearl Harbor overdone. Its just one more reason that Disney sucks a** and is the earthly corporate embodiment of Satan.

I was thoroughly pissed off when they didn't introduce Morrow in that player introduction scene when they said their names and the school they played for. I think I would have wet my pants to hear "Bowling Green" in a movie that big. F*cking Disney.

Yeah I agree. I remember being in the theater waiting to hear "Ken Morrow, Bowling Green," but it never came. And that whole Minnesota/Boston thing was ridiculous. Out of all the specials done on that team, that movie is really the only place I've ever heard that stuff emphasized. In fact, when I was watching ESPN this morning, a SportsCenter segment they ran on the team quoted Eruzione as saying that the team got along great from the start, and it doesn't get much more reliable than that. I think players fighting was something that Disney embellished to spice things up a bit. It does crack me up how Disney still tries to propell this wholesome family image, when they are really only a small cut above Enron.

Bleeding Orange · Post by **Bleeding Orange** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 11:45 pm

You know, I just watched this game in its entirety for the first time in my life, and I can only find one word to describe it - electirfying. Even 25 years later, interrupted by interviews with Jim Craig and Mike Eruzione, I watched this game as if it were happening for the first time. Everytime the US team scored a goal I jumped a bit. Everytime the Soviets scored a goal I marvelled at their talent. Excepting a few BG games that I have witnessed in person, I have never had that type of reaction to a hockey game, and certainly not to that level.

Also, I have watched (twice now) Michael Wilbon try to diminish the effect of this game by stating that there was no run-up to the game and that not many people cared about the game until after it happened. I've heard him say the same thing in the past on PTI. Well, he's a friggin' moron who is just trying to make a name for himself that he will never have. The very fact that there was no run-up to this game and no one realized its magnitude until afterwards is testament to how big of an upset it truly was. Wilbon was right in pointing out that a game such as this one would never be shown in tape-delay in today's sports climate, but the fact that it was not shown in real-time, again, proves just how big of a victory this was, not only for USA Hockey, but for the USA itself.

As a student of history and being congnizant of what was taking place in February of 1980 politically and socially, I suppose I am in somewhat of a different position to appreciate this game than most. But, from this position, I would have to say that this was truly one of the greatest events in American history, given its context, as great as VE and VJ day. I know that may sound insulting to some whose family members gave their lives during WWII, but when you think about the state of the American consciousness and what transpired in US/Soviet relations in the decade that followed this game, in my mind there is no doubt of this. No other moment in sports -- at any time in human history -- can claim this level of socio-political impact. If this game can elicit the kind of emotional response that it has in me, someone who was born over a year after it took place, I can only imagine what it must have been like to experience it first-hand.

Also, I have to add that this team was FAST! I have never in my life seen a team beat out icing the way this team did. Apparently those "Herbies" did the trick!

FALCON FLIER · Post by **FALCON FLIER** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 9:35 am

I watched the replay last night for maybe the 10th time and I still get emotional when the game ends. I noticed last night that while I knew the USA won I half expected the Soviets to score late in the game. When the game was played back in 1980, it was in the late afternoon and I knew the USA had won before the replay was shown that evening. This was during the glory days of BG hockey and having Mark Wells and Ken Morrow on that team was a high point. Morrow went on that year to play on the Stanley Cup champion New York Islanders making him perhaps the only player ever to win both the Olympic gold medal and the Stanley Cup in the same year. (of course with NHL players routinely playing in the Olympics today that has probably changed.)

Falconfreak90 · Post by **Falconfreak90** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 3:12 pm

I watched and taped that ESPN Classic special last night....I still go crazy with excitement seeing the USA win. That last 10 min was the longest 10 min in the history of time. Back in 1980, I was 12 and didn't know who won the game. My mom came home from the store beaming ear to ear...she heard the score on the local radio station. We didn't know the score! I thought for sure, the Soviets were gonna score in the end. The best was Jim McKay on the wrap up show..."This is one of the biggest upsets in the history of sports!! It's like....a bunch of Canadian college football all stars beating the Pittsburg Steelers!"
I don't know if I'll ever see anything of that magnitude again....at least until BGSU beats USC in the Rose Bowl in the near future!

Having most of that game on tape now is a treasure. Gonna tape the Gold Medal game tomorrow night @8 vs Finland.

Those Olympic Games were my first real exposure to hockey. I watched every game in the tournament. It was very cool to hear Al Michaels mention Bowling Green when Morrow was on the ice.

What a great event it was....the Soviet players were stunned. They had won all the time...in the USSR, their job was to play hockey. They were pros. They had forgotten how great the feeling of winning was. I feel bad for them now...they couldn't go anywhere in the Soviet Union without people asking how they could possibly lose to a bunch of "college boys".

Truly an awesome event.

bobby bo · Post by **bobby bo** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 4:37 pm

Yeah i also watched that game for the first time in its entirety last night and the emotions that went through me when i heard Al Michaels count down those last 10 seconds was amazing...of course this event took place 3 years before i was born, so i can't grasp the whole importance of it, but i do know that it is one thing that will stick in my mind forever

TG1996 · Post by **TG1996** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 11:07 pm

Just saw a script for a story here at work, Ken Morrow was at the anniversary party for the '80 Olympics/Miracle on Ice, I think they just brought some of the guys (and girls) out and they gave speeches and might have answered questions. Possibly worth keeping an eye on headline news throughout the evening and tomorrow morning, maybe even the Today show (since this was on an NBC feed).

kdog27 · Post by **kdog27** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 11:21 pm

Has anyone here ever been to Lake Placid? It's a beautiful area and the town is really something. The outdoor speed skating rink where Eric Heiden won his 5 golds is pretty cool. I liked that they did that outside. Whiteface is one of the best ski resorts in the northeast. I have been to all the big name places in Vermont and Maine and it is my favorite. It's more of a hardcore skier's mountain.

It amazes me that a town that small and in the middle of nowhere hosted the olympics two times(1932). There is nothing close to LP, the weather is bad, and there are only 6,000 residents. Outside of LP there are many cabins and rental places that were only occupied at the time of the 80 olympics, and have been rottiing away ever since.