Marcus (Woody Harrelson), a former minor-league basketball coach with dreams of coaching an NBA team someday is not a favorite among the sport higher-ups. So when he gets fired from his previous job, gets drunk, then arrested for hitting a police car on his way home he is soon after locked up. That is until his former boss, Coach Phil Perretti (Ernie Hudson) bails him out. Marcus in a court of law has two choices whether to spend years in jail or take three months of community service. Take a guess which one he decided to take!
His job for the next three months is to coach a team of special students to play basketball under the watchful eyes of Julio (Cheech Marin). Marcus does not have the best people skills so everyone wonders how he will work with the group of friends, Showtime (Bradley Edens), Arthur (Alex Hintz), Blair (Tom Sinclair), Cody (Ashton Gunning), Marlon (Casey Metcalfe), Benny (James Day Keith), Craig (Matthew Von Der Ahe) and also Marcus love interest, Alex (Kaitlin Olson), her brother is Johnny (Kevin Iannucci). At day one, Marcus had a job of making them a team to make it to the finals but he knew he needed Darius (Joshua Felder) on his team but for some reason the excellent ball player has a dislike for Marcus. Everyday Marcus worked with the friends as they learned how to actually play ball and Marcus even learned several life lessons along the way. Yet when a late comer named Cosentino (Madison Tevlin) joins the team Marcus finds he is faced with a very strong personality. Throughout the ninety days Marcus faces his demons and the friends all learn how to play a great game of basketball. But are they good enough to make it to the finals?
I enjoyed the film and thought the direction was well done and the writing even more so but I did notice a few moments that maybe should have been dropped on the editing floor. That and the fact the movie could have been about a half hour shorter. There is some character development on the team but not enough to become more invested in some of the supporting players and supporting actors. Harrelson was awesome and I enjoyed Olson as his love interest but it is Iannucci and Tevlin that won my heart. This is a good film that is sure to warm you heart, teach you a few lessons about caring and make you realize that the world is filled with all types of people and many of them especially with a handicap deserve respect. I also liked the crotch sniffing rottweiler as well.
