U.S. Hockey Stood Tall at Squaw Valley Olympics

Before Lake Placid, there was Squaw Valley.

In the history of U.S. ice hockey in the Olympic Games, two years stand out: 1960 and 1980.

Freshest in most memories is the gold-medal win at Lake Placid, N.Y., when the U.S. beat the Soviet Union in the semifinals and Finland in the final.

It had happened before.

On this date in 1960, in the semifinals of the Olympic tournament at Squaw Valley, Calif., a U.S. team beat the USSR in the Olympics for the first time. The score was 3-2 in a game requiring the Americans to employ a stout defense for the game’s final 4:59.

That’s when, from several feet in front of the Soviet goalie, Roger Christian whacked the puck into the net for a 3-2 lead.

The capacity crowd of 9,000 exploded in cheers, then almost had to hold its breath for the duration, when its countrymen staved off every Soviet assault. The tension reached the breaking point when, with a minute to play, the Soviet coach pulled his goalie and added another offensive player.

It didn’t work. The American goalie, John McCartan, slapped away every Soviet shot down the stretch (he had 31 saves for the game), allowing the crowd to count off the final seconds.

The shot of the game was the first goal, a 35-footer by Bill Cleary, off an assist by his brother, Bob.

It was almost anticlimactic the next night when the Americans scored six times in the final period to rout Czechoslovakia, 9-4, in the gold-medal game.

Also on this date: In 1980, Anna Marie Lopez scored 27 points and had 14 rebounds to help the USC’s women’s basketball team defeat UCLA, 99-81, for its first victory at Pauley Pavilion. . . . In 1977, Chicago’s Stan Mikita scored the 500th goal of his NHL career.