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This tournament, hosted by the Northwest Warriors Bantam 1 team in Calgary at the Murray Copot Arena, is designed as a standard 4-team tournament with a round robin phase followed by 'A' and 'B' finals. The tournament runs from the early evening of Friday, December 21, 2018 through to mid-afternoon on Sunday, December 23, 2018. The derivation of the tournament name stems from a combination of a secular holiday from popular culture (Festivus, of the sitcom Seinfeld fame) and the greatest hockey upset story of the past 100 years, being the Miracle on Ice which occurred at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York. For further background on these references, read on.
Festivus is a secular holiday celebrated on December 23 as an alternative to the pressures and commercialism of the Christmas season. Originally a family tradition of scriptwriter Dan O'Keefe, who worked on the American sitcom Seinfeld, Festivus entered popular culture after it was made the focus of the 1997 episode "The Strike". The non-commercial holiday's celebration, as depicted on Seinfeld, occurs on December 23 and includes a Festivus dinner, an unadorned aluminum Festivus pole, practices such as the "Airing of Grievances" and "Feats of Strength", and the labeling of easily explainable events as "Festivus miracles". The episode refers to it as "a Festivus for the rest of us".
The "Miracle on Ice" was a medal-round game during the men's ice hockey tournament at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York, played between the hosting United States, and the four-time defending gold medalists, the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union had won the gold medal in five of the six previous Winter Olympic Games, and were the favorites to win once more in Lake Placid. The team consisted primarily of professional players with significant experience in international play. By contrast, the United States' team—led by head coach Herb Brooks—consisted exclusively of amateur players, and was the youngest team in the tournament and in U.S. national team history. In the group stage, both the Soviet and U.S. teams were unbeaten; the U.S. achieved several notable results, including a 2–2 draw against Sweden, and a 7–3 upset victory over second-place favorites Czechoslovakia.
For the first game in the medal round, the United States played the Soviets. Finishing the first period tied at 2–2, and the Soviets leading 3–2 following the second, the U.S. team scored two more goals to take their first lead during the third and final period, winning the game 4–3 in a major upset against their Cold War rival. Following the game, the U.S. went on to clinch the gold medal by beating Finland in their final match of the tournament. Likewise, the Soviet Union took the silver medal by beating Sweden.
The victory became one of the most iconic moments of the Games and in U.S. sports. Equally well-known was the television call of the final seconds of the game by Al Michaels for ABC, in which he declared: "Do you believe in miracles?! YES!" In 1999, Sports Illustrated named the "Miracle on Ice" the top sports moment of the 20th century.
