Last night, I watched Coach Carter in its entirety for the first time. I’ve seen about half of it a couple of months ago at the insistence of my boyfriend, Sidney. We were flipping channels, and it was on HBO, but I didn’t want to see it because I thought it was just another feel-good basketball movie. But he won out, and even though it is a feel-good basketball movie, it’s also based on a true story, and some parts made me cry. As a bonus, Channing Tatum is in the movie, although I noticed that only after I’ve seen Step Up, when Sidney was enumerating Channing’s movies which I’ve seen before (namely She’s the Man and Coach Carter.)

As an aside, I read that before playing the Jason Lyle character in this movie, Channing has never played basketball before. He had to get some personal training to get him up to speed with the other players, one of which was Antwon Tanner, who plays the role of Skills in my favorite TV show One Tree Hill. But more on OTH on a future post.

Here are my favorite inspirational moments from Coach Carter (in chronological order):

#1 When Timo Cruz couldn’t finish his task of 1000 suicides and 2500 pushups in one week (which was his punishment for leaving the team the first time), Jason Lyle (played by Channing Tatum) stepped up and offered to do pushups for his teammate. He told Coach Carter, “You said we’re a team. One person struggles, we all struggle. One person triumphs, we all triumph.” The entire team followed suit and did their part to help the exhausted Timo complete his punishment.

#2 When the people wanted to forcibly end the lockout and let the boys play despite the fact that more than half of them were failing in class, Coach Ken Carter got up to say the following:

“You really need to consider the message you’re sending this boys by ending the lockout. It’s the same message that we as a culture send to our professional athletes; and that is that they are above the law. If these boys cannot honor the simple rules of a basketball contract, how long do you think it will be before they’re out there breaking the law? I played ball here at Richmond high 30 years ago. It was the same thing then; some of my teammates went to prison, some of them even ended up dead. If you vote to end the lockout, you won’t have to terminate me; I’ll quit.”

#3 When the board ended up voting in favor of ending the lockout, Coach Carter went back to the gym to pack up his things and go home. He was stunned to see his players sitting on desks and studying in the middle of the court. Jason said, “Sir, they can cut the chains off the door, but they can’t make us play.” Damien explained, “We’ve decided we’re going to finish what you’ve started, sir.” And Worm couldn’t resist adding, “Yeah, so leave us be, Coach. We’ve got sh*t to do, sir.” That was funny and touching at the same time. But the best moment has to be when Timo stood up (and you remember how he was when he went to Coach Carter’s house in the middle of the night after his cousin got shot), and quoted the words of Marianne Williamson, which Nelson Mandela once used in a speech. This is what he said:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine as children do. It’s not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own lights shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

Wow. That’s really something. It’s more powerful if you see it in the context of the entire movie. The final song they played after the team lost their playoffs game is also a must-see (“Hope” by Twista featuring Faith Evans), and Channing is in the music video so that’s a bonus for me.