The men’s Olympic ice hockey tournament has seen many changes since the first games were played in 1960. For most of that time, the tournament was played on international-sized ice, but in 1994, organizers changed to NHL dimensions for greater consistency and better sightlines for TV cameras. They also began to standardize the game in modern indoor arenas with artificial ice.
During the first period of the semi-final in Lake Placid on February 22, 1980, it seemed as though the U.S. team had barely woken up. The Soviets led 2-0 before Buzz Schneider tied it up with a dagger of a slap shot. Then, with seconds left before the start of the second period, Mark Johnson snagged a rare deflection off of the legendary goalie Vladislav Tretiak and scored what came to be known as the “Miracle on Ice.”
After a 2-2 third period, the Americans put the game away in the final period. The team slapped in two more goals and Jim Craig stopped 28 of 31 shots to give the U.S. a 7-3 victory over Czechoslovakia.
The win was the first of five gold medals for the Americans under Herb Brooks, and it was the beginning of the end for the Soviet/Russian/United States dynasty. It wasn’t quite the collapse that was hinted at in the media before the 1988 Calgary Olympics, but it would take another three years before the dynasty finally crumbled under the weight of Perestroika.