A full eight years before the Miracle on Ice, the US Olympic hockey team pulled off one of the most miraculous accomplishments in international hockey history. The 1972 US team stunned the hockey world by garnering a silver medal at the Winter Games in Japan. The silver medal championship was somewhat anti-climatic by today's gold-medal showdown standards. Back then the order of finish was determined by your win-loss record and your goals for and against. After upsetting the Czechoslovakians, Team USA sat in the arena in their casual wear awaiting the outcome of the Russia-Czechoslovakian game. When the Russians won, as expected, the Americans knew they had clinched a very unexpected silver medal, the only medal taken home by American males in the Sapporo games. The story is even more fascinating when you learn of the military background many of these players were drafted into before the games, including a few who wandered the jungles of Vietnam. Then there was the surprising camar