Ultimate Highlight

OK, Eliskimo, here’s a real post. Only, what, 3 months later 🙂

So ESPN just went through a long process to determine the most notable sports highlight.

The one highlight that still gives me chills won. It wasn’t any of the Super Bowl victories of the Dallas Cowboys. It wasn’t Joe Carter ending a World Series. It wasn’t Kellen Winslow in Miami in the best NFL game I have ever watched. It wasn’t Danny Manning and KU in 1988. None of the great highlights of history like Carlton Fisk, or Bobby Thomsen, or “down goes Frazier!” have that much impact on me.

Nope, it’s the one highlight that my eyes tear up every time. Even 28 years later.

I remember this event clearly. I was only 12 at the time. I remember watching it on a black and white TV at a house my parents rented when we moved to Wichita. It was an odd house that reflected the 1970s, and had a slightly raised alcove where we’d put the TV. There were no chairs, I had to sit on the ugly orange-brown shag carpet popular then.

But that’s where I saw Mike Eruzione score the goal that put the US up 4-3. And that’s where I watched Jim Craig and the rest somehow, someway, incredibly survive the frantic attempts by the Russians to tie the game.

Yes, Al Michaels, I do believe in miracles.

3 thoughts on “Ultimate Highlight”

  1. That’s how I found hockey–or at least how the seeds were planted. That victory meant so much more than just an Olympic gold medal.

    I still have a commemorative glass from Wendy’s celebrating the victory.

    And I’m doing a Toastmasters speech this week on this very topic.

    (btw–have you seen the excellent movie on this? Best hockey footage I’ve ever seen in a movie.)

    1. You mean the recent Disney Miracle? Yes, I did see it. I really liked it. I wept again at the end. 🙂

      I thought Kurt Russell did a fantastic job as Herb Brooks.

      Looking at the IMDB trivia it notes that most of Team USA in the movie was chosen for their hockey, not their acting skills. I wonder when CSI:NY is going to take advantage of that with Eddie Cahill, who played Jim Craig.

      There is also this one:
      http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082754/
      From 1981. I’m sure I watched it when it came out, but I don’t remember it. I may have to find a DVD of it. BTW, Jim Craig was played in this one by another actor who went on to portray a policeman, Steve Guttenberg.

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