Maricica Puică is a retired Romanian middle-distance runner. She is the 1984 Olympic champion in the 3,000 metres. One of the greatest female middle-distance runners of the 1980s, she also twice won the World Cross Country Championship and broke the world record for the mile in 1982.

At the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, 41 events in athletics were contested. There were a total number of 1273 participating athletes from 124 countries. Women's marathon, women's 3000 meters, and women's 400 meters hurdles debuted at these Games.