Viewed in
2010
Premise
Part of ESPN's 30 for 30 series, a documentary about Paul Westhead's basketball coaching career and Hank Gathers' shocking death.
Liked
The well-handled section about Gathers' last game.
Thoughts
I thought it could have been a lot more.
There were some good interviews, including Westhead, Hank Gathers' brother, and his teammates. For me, I learned the most from Derrick Gather, such as Hank's childhood and motivation to play professional basketball. What was most interesting was that Hank was actually right-handed, and shot free throws left-handed in attempt to better his game. The visual diagram of a play from "the system" was insightful as well.
Things got really emotional when it came to Gathers' collapse, and the NCAA tournament that followed. I was a little too young to understand at the time. Thankfully, the documentary did not try anything fancy with it, and just let the key players explain the moment, sometimes with sad silence.
I wished that they went into more detail about the aftermath of his death, in terms of lessons learned (or still not learned, such as Reggie Lewis), and the awareness. Nevertheless, this story was more about Westhead, hence the title. Which I guess was my main problem with it: the direction. I cared more about Hank Gathers, and I believed that was a more compelling story than the coach. Is that a legitimate criticism of this movie? I think it is.
It was cathartic to relive death and tournament portions, and I learned some interesting background information, but overall, I wished the documentary was something it was not.
What I would change
Reduced the number of chapters with Shakespearean titles. We get it, Westhead used to be a Shakespearean teacher. It's repetitive and annoying. Adding nicknames to each minor player who appeared on camera was kind of annoying and unnecessary as well.
Random
Was that former Laker great "Big Shot Rob" Robert Horry putting up a prayer in round three of the 1990 NCAA tournament?
