February 16th, 2010

My own miracle on ice…almost!

We all have our Olympic memories and I have mine.

Back in 1980, I was lucky enough to attend the Winter Olympics in Lake Placid and, if you know anything about the Olympics, that was the gold-medal winner. It was the Olympics where the underdog USA hockey team beat the thought-to-be-unbeatable Russian team in the semi-finals. And I had a ticket to the event.

But that’s only the beginning of the story.

I was working for the Daily News in 1980 and was sent to the Olympics at the 11th hour when an editor came up to me (Why me, I have no idea to this day. I was a young, unseasoned reporter.) and said, “Hey do you want to go up to the Olympics? We need some help up there.”

It was typical Daily News. Nothing was planned — ever. It’s not like the Olympics was a surprise! The Olympics had already begun when this conversation took place. I was outfitted with a red winter jacket, some decent boots and was told to report to the White Plains airport (That’s a photo of me in my Olympic red jacket at a ski house I rented with friends around the same time. The hat is a hand-me-down from Wyatt Earp). White Plains? I went there and learned I’d be flying up in a two-seat mail plane!! No one had mentioned this tiny detail.

Well, okay. I was still going to the Olympics. I hopped into the only available seat — the one the pilot wasn’t in. Before we took off, the pilot jumped out, reached into the engine (maybe it was the wing) and pulled out a dip stick. Then he added a couple of quarts of oil. I am NOT kidding. (So maybe this is why they asked me to go!)

I can’t say it didn’t faze me but I didn’t bolt. In fact, I didn’t get too upset until we were up in the air and the pilot — who looked to be in his 50s — began sweating profusely. I thought, if this guy has a heart attack, I’m going down.

So I began asking the guy about the instruments and he told me basically how to fly the plane. But things settled down and he got us up to Lake Placid without my assistance (now that would have been an Olympic event).

The next two weeks were a whirlwind of covering the news side of the Olympics, and during my downtime, attending various events. The ice skating was great because it was indoors. Luge and bobsled? Those are the worst events to attend in person. You freeze your butt off for hours only to see a whoosh go by in a fraction of a second. You wouldn’t recognize your twin brother in the luge.

And there were some scary moments, mostly of my own imagination. The medal ceremonies were held on Lake Placid with hundreds of people, a giant stage and even some trucks. City boy that I am, I was convinced the ice was going to crack and everyone was going to drown so I made sure to hang back so I could take notes and phone in the story that, well, never happened.

The most fun was off the ice. The Olympic Village bars were hopping each night and I got to attend one VIP party when I leaned over to a colleague and said, “That chick over there looks just like Dorothy Hamill.”

My colleague looked at me incredulously and said, “That is Dorothy Hamill you asshole.”

Oh. But the Olympics had yet to reach its defining event — the hockey semi-finals. I begged the sports editor for a ticket to the USA-Russian hockey game and, at the last moment, he knocked on my door and held out the ticket!

Fantastic. But I was bushed and decided to take a nap just before the game.  Before I knew it, I was awakened by fireworks and ran outside to learn that Team USA had pulled off the Miracle on Ice, later celebrated in books, movies, you name it. I think a Broadway play might be in the works!

But…but…but I sputtered. I only fell asleep for a second. I reached into my pocket and still had the prized ticket. I looked at my watch — hours had gone by.

It was time to work. I grabbed my notebook and went outside to interview people about what a great game it was and how happy they were that Team USA had won. I gritted my teeth and smiled through it all.

Then I dumped my notes to sports columnist Mike Lupica, one of my roommates, who was writing the next day’s front page story. “Man, that was some game,” he said.

It sure was.

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