June 02, 2002
Question - if the US
Question - if the US Soccer Team won the world cup, would it be a bigger deal than when the US Hockey Team won gold in the 1980 Olympics? I haven't decided yet.In terms of culture, I'd say that soccer in other nations has more storied momentum than Russia and Finland had for hockey in 1980. It's an older sport and a richer tradition.
And the US Team certainly isn't expected to win it all. I haven't seen any articles where the coach or players even dare to say that they think they might have a chance. It would certainly be a huge story. They're 250-1 underdogs, and they probably have less chance than that.
But compared to Lake Placid? I don't know. Maybe if the Taliban had a soccer team favored to win it all, but they don't. And we've got pro players, it's not a bunch of hand-picked amateurs.
So I guess my preliminary opinion is that it wouldn't be as big of a deal as Lake Placid, at least not inside of the US borders. Outside, however, I think the level of shock in the rest of the world would far exceed what happened in Lake Placid.
Posted by Curt at June 2, 2002 05:01 PM