Sunday is Hockey Day in America, and the Blue Jackets find themselves in the Big Apple for a game against their Metropolitan Division rivals, the New York Rangers. It is comforting and quite fitting on this day that both teams wear red, white and blue uniforms.
The Blueshirts currently sit in second place (76 points) in the division and are 7-1-2 in their last 10 games. The Blue Jackets (55 points) are still on the outside looking in, trailing the Boston Bruins by 10 points for the second wild card position. Columbus has recorded 5-5-0 in their last 10 games.
The expectation is for a spirited and intense game between these two teams. One is fighting to solidify their playoff positioning, while the other is looking to make a stretch run that will see them make a consecutive playoff appearance for the first time in their history.
And as part of the synergy of this day, one cannot forget the historic meaning of what occurred 35 years ago on February 22, 1980. In what has become an indelible moment in American sports history, on that day the U.S. team stunned the vaunted Soviet Union national hockey team, beating them 4-3.
The now legendary Herb Brooks, as coach of the U.S. hockey team, took a group of ragamuffin players and molded them into a cohesive unit that believed they could accomplish anything. The fact that Brooks was able to do this in just 244 days from the first practice on June 25, 1979 to winning the gold medal in Lake Placid, NY on February 24, 1980 is nothing short of astounding.
Just 13 days before these teams met in the round-robin medal round, the Soviets had soundly beaten the U.S. 10-3 at Madison Square Garden and very likely led to them underestimating the Brooks-coached team. The average age of that American team was just 21 years old, making them the youngest team in U.S. team history to play in the Olympics, while at the same time being the youngest team in the Olympic tournament.
It truly became a "David vs. Goliath" storyline as the bunch of U.S. college kids went 4-0-1 in group play, outscoring their opponents by the combined score of 25-10. The Soviets cruised through their group stage, dominating their opponents by a combined score of 51-11 for a record of 5-0-0.
And 35 years ago, fell Goliath they did. Center Mark Johnson tied the score 2-2 at the end of the first period, prompting the Soviet coach, Viktor Tikhonov, to overreact and pull his world-class goalie Vladislav Tretiak and replace him with the backup goalie, Vladimir Myshkin, for the remainder of the game.
Johnson again tied the game, this time in the third period 3-3. One minute and 21 seconds after Johnson tied the game, team captain Mike Eruzione gave the United States their first lead of the game. Holding that lead for what seemed like the longest ten minutes of their lives, Herb Brooks rolled four lines and kept the shifts short, beating the Soviets with speed and conditioning, not to mention having a pretty good Jim Craig between the pipes.
In the middle of the Cold War, with the Soviets and the United States doing battle on an ice hockey rink, television broadcaster Al Michaels captured the moment perfectly with his call of, "Do you believe in miracles?! Yes!!" Two days after beating the Soviets, they beat Finland 4-2 to win the gold medal.
It became one of the greatest sports stories of all time. It was a collection of kids from Minnesota, Wisconsin, Massachusetts and Michigan representing their country on home soil and accomplishing this feat on the world stage of the Olympic Games.
This moment in history even has an Ohio tie-in. Defenseman Ken Morrow and center Mark Wells, the only two players on the team from Michigan, attended college and played for the Bowling Green State University Falcons men's ice hockey team.
The comparison here is that the Blue Jackets face a daunting, uphill climb in making the playoffs, just as the American team did in making the medal round. If they do grab a spot in the post-season, it will be a great accomplishment for this young Columbus team, although not on par with the United States beating the Soviets in 1980.
And that, at the end of the day, really is the crux of the biscuit. Each generation of sports teams and their fans have that "miracle" moment that they hope will lead to a warm and fuzzy feeling washing over them.
The Blue Jackets have to play better, more consistent hockey than they've played all season. They believe they can do it. And until they are mathematically eliminated, who are we to doubt them?
The Blue Jackets take on the New York Rangers at 7:30 p.m. with the FOX Sports Ohio pregame show "Blue Jackets LIVE" beginning at 7:00 p.m.
