Glory Road Review

Let me make this clear right from the get-go. I am not a sport.

I haven't followed sports with any passion since1972, when my dad retired from the Navy and we moved to Montana. Before that, I was a St. Louis Cardinals baseball fan, because my dad was a Cardinals fan. His heros had been Stan "The Man" Musial and Dizzy Dean. Mine were Bob Gibson, Lou Brock and Curt Flood. After the Padres joined the major leagues, we would go to the game whenever the Cardinals were in town.

But things have changed. Monday, on the way to work, one of the grocery stores had an ad on the radio saying they were the source of all I needed for the big game. "What big game?" I said. Then I thought a little. It was the end of January (a little more thinking). Oh. The Super Bowl. Then I stopped paying attention, because I had no "needs" for the big game.

Right now, out of about 250 DVDs that I own, only four are sports related: A League of Their Own, Chariots of Fire, Remember the Titans, and Miracle. In a few months, though, when Glory Road comes out on DVD, I will own that one too.

Josh Lucas was superb as Coach Don Haskins, a high school girls' basketball coach brought to Texas Western College to keep an eye on the basketball players. Except that Haskins didn't get the message and actually tried to win, bringing black players to the lily-white El Paso team.

The movie spends a lot of time outside the games, focusing on players, both black and white, having to adjust suddenly to an extreme change in their world. The way they meet the challenges within the team, as well as from outside, is where the story is strongest.

The game scenes were beautifully edited, cutting quickly from player to player, from pass to basket to coach, in a way that would seem choppy in another movie. In Glory Road, the cuts told us everything we needed to know--when they were winning and when they were falling apart--in images, impressions, and the eyes of the coach.

If you haven't seen Glory Road and your theater hasn't edged it out in favor of the Oscar pretenders, see it on the big screen. Soon.