Sports Illustrated recently listed their top 15 US Winter Olympic moments and the 1960 gold medal team was ranked #2. To view the entire list and notes about the team visit: SI.com
By pucksandbooks
21 December, 2009
Imagine setting out to document in film a historic sports achievement which by virtue of its time period offers only minimal archival footage. A great, great story to be told without much in the way of camera-eye evidence. Such was the dilemma-challenge confronted by Andrew Sherburne and Tommy Haines, makers of the celebrated 2007 documentary ‘Pond Hockey,’ with their aim of chronicling the American hockey team’s gold medal performance at the 1960 Winter Olympics in ‘Forgotten Miracle .
And yet in the skilled filmmaking hands of these special hockey hearts what is ostensibly a project-damning weakness is instead turned into an asset: ‘Forgotten Miracle’ is rife with moving imagery alright, it’s just that we’re moved in this movie not so much by big-game footage or delirious, patriotic fan celebrations but rather the misty-eyed reflections of the now aged American sports heroes who carried off America’s first true Miracle on Ice.
This film’s aim is straightforward and noble — to correct the shortsighted presumption all too commonly held that the history of American hockey began in 1980 at Lake Placid. Most assuredly it did not….
To read the entire OFB article please visit onfrozenblog.com
Ten years ago our friend E.M. Swift of SI wrote a fantastic article on a forgotten legend.
December 13, 1999
John Mayasich was a wizard on ice but never got a shot to prove it in the NHL.
Last Friday, at the annual U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame induction dinner in Minneapolis, the Wayne Gretzky Award, which honors an individual for his or her contributions to U.S. hockey, was introduced. The first recipient, fittingly, was the award’s namesake. Among those who joined in applauding Gretzky was a broad-shouldered, soft-spoken Minnesotan: 66-year-old John Mayasich, who in his playing days could have laid claim to being the Great One of U.S. hockey.
That Mayasich is little known outside his home state is an accident of time and place rather than the result of any limitation in his skills. “I don’t care who you name, John could have played with them,” says former Harvard coach Billy Cleary…
To read the entire Swift article please visit the SI Vault
Be a Fan!
Be a Facebook fan of the 1960 U.S. Gold Medal hockey team!