“Later, at the news conference, while the young players giggled like schoolboys, they told how Brooks had said before the game, ‘You were meant to be here.’

”Quite dramatic, I thought. When the conference ended, I collared Brooks. ‘Herb, did you really say that?’

“He reached into his jacket breast pocket and pulled out a card. Scrawled on it were the words, You were meant to be here.”

— Gerald Eskenazi, New York Times sports reporter, recalling the “Miracle on Ice” U.S. victory over the Soviet Union, 4-3, in Lake Placid, NY, 40 years ago today.