The Dream Team

The Dream Team
Gerard Jelloe
“The Boys of the Winter” by Wayne Coffey

    For those who are interested and in hockey you probably know about the 1980 Winter Olympics and how the U.S.A hockey team won the tournament. The author somewhat talks about the “untold story of a coach, a dream and the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team” from what I have read. In the start of the book, Coffey offers background information like many authors do. The book first talks about some events that happened prior to the big game ,then how the soviets became a superpower in the sport of hockey and information about the players of both teams. I could tell you about all this background information but you would be less interested in reading the rest of this review. The background information of the players helps the reader understand what kind of person they are but it is not what the reader wants to read about when picking up the book hoping to learn about the great story. He switches in the book from the game itself to life stories of different players, whenever they make a big play in the game, multiple times which was kind of confusing and annoying when reading it. If Coffey focused more on the story and what makes it so significant rather than where all the players are from and what their life was like as a young boy. Throughout the book, Coffey’s time and voice doesn’t really change; The whole time his voice is really bleak and not really exciting. It is hard to sound exciting when you are talking about someone’s life but the whole time you read text like “Buzz Schneider would pass through Embarrass on his trips to Eveleth, where his wife, Gayle, grew up” (page 51) and “he lives outside the Twin Cities, but when winter finally lifts, he and Gayle and family spend as much time as they can in the family cabin”(page 52). When Coffey offers some excitement, it is kind of out of nowhere; he will be talking about Buzz Schnieders life and then says “Schneider’s goal sent a surge of excitement in the crowd”(page 53) in the next paragraph. The parts that seem exciting are just in the wrong places in the plot which cause a loss in interest.

I  have not read all of the book but from the portion that I read, I can not say that I have enjoyed it. For those who would like to know more about the players, this could definitely be a good read but i was hoping to read more about the significance of the game and less about where Buzz Schneider is from and what his first job was. To sum everything up, I personally would not recommend this book to people who just want to know a little more about the great triumph by the 1980 U.S.A olympic Hockey team, but I would recommend this book to someone that is doing a report on the event or someone who really wants know about every player and other relevant facts and details to the event.