Mike Eruzione, the captain of the U.S. “Miracle on Ice” hockey team, said he likely would not have put one of President Trump’s “Keep America Great” hats on at a campaign rally if he knew it would “piss” people off.
“If we knew we were going to piss off this many people, we probably would not have put the hats on,” Eruzione told the Washington Post in a piece published Tuesday. “That’s the big question here. A lot of the stuff I got was, ‘You guys said it’s not political, but when you put the hats on, you made it political.'”
“You going to light into me, too? We’re getting killed!” the captain said about the reaction. The members of the team had been handed hats as they came on stage. Four former team members declined to put on the hats, but 10 of them did.
Eruzione said he received lots of angry messages and phone calls from people upset that he had put on the red “Keep America Great” hat.
Trump brought the team on stage at a campaign rally in Las Vegas on Friday. The team was recognized for the 40th anniversary of its victory over the Soviet Union’s hockey team in the 1980 Winter Olympics. The U.S. hockey team that year, which was mostly composed of amateur players, defeated the Soviet team 4-3 in what is considered one of the all-time greatest upsets in sports history.
