Ice Wars

Hardly anyone has written so harshly and in such detail about this side of domestic hockey—most people only mentioned it in passing, trying to cover up the difficult topic as quickly as possible. Fifty years ago, in world sports history, one of the brightest events took place: the first series of matches in hockey history featuring the Soviet Union national team against Canadian professionals. The “Maple Leafs”—millionaires and superheroes who could easily smash every team in the world—met the Soviet team with contempt, calling them a bunch of amateurs whose goalie is a hole. Almost all sports commentators predicted a shameful rout for our team.

But then the referee’s whistle blew—and within thirty seconds, Phil Esposito opened the scoring. Six minutes later, the score doubled, and the sound of a funeral march echoed over the ice arena as the local fans mocked them. It would have been better if the tapper at the Montreal stadium hadn’t done that. Our hockey players seemed to have risen from the dead and began ruthlessly tearing into the Canadian professionals on the ice. The Canadians broke the rules, the referees turned a blind eye, and the world fell silent in shock—yet the Russians kept beating the arrogant opponents methodically and confidently… And then it became clear: this was no longer just a sporting contest. Before millions of viewers, two worlds, two ideologies, two moral codes collided in a brutal clash…

The book tells:
— How our team was stripped of the won “Canada Cup.”
— Why “the God and King of the NHL” was nicknamed a hockey hooligan.
— What Canadian players did to the referees in the airplane lounge.
— How the Canadians accredited Banderа at the 1976 Olympics in Montreal.
— How an NHL coach forced his players to physically eliminate our hockey players.
— How Canadian journalists devoured their own newspaper articles after losing a bet.

The book will not only remind us of the courage and sporting heroism of our celebrated hockey players in all Soviet-Canadian hockey competitions starting from 1954. It will help us understand ourselves—our national spirit, our will, and our belief in victory.