Glory Road Essay

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The film that will be discussed today is Glory Road (2006), which was directed by James Gartner, starring Josh Lucas, Derek Duke, and Austin Nichols. The film perpetrates the true story of Dan Haskins who became a coach for the NCAA men’s basketball team the Texas Western Miners. The film takes place during the time of the civil rights movement where African Americans were fighting against racial discrimination, and segregation. In order to obtain a team for the college, he had to recruit elsewhere and managed to recruit 7 talented black players from different backgrounds to play with 5 Caucasian college males. Coach Haskin broke the barriers in the NCAA by putting blacks in the starting lineup which was something unheard of at the time because …show more content…

One of the scenes that has a historical concept to some concepts learned during lecture for this course was the scene was when the team was celebrating at a restaurant that was dominantly all whites. One of the players Nevel Shed, was followed into the restroom by 2 racist white individuals who knew they just had beaten their team earlier. They then assaulted him by beating him senseless as a reminder that blacks were not welcomed in town and in the NCAA. The whole team had to flee the restaurant in attempts to calm the situation down and avoid any more conflict. To their surprise they came back to their hotels to see that it was broken into and put a lot of racist threats and to ask them to leave town because they weren’t welcomed there. This was a similar scenario that Jackie Robinson had to endure for joining the Dodgers in 1947. He was the subject of racial taunts and threats for playing in the MLB (major league baseball) …show more content…

I also noticed how they tied in of how the civil rights movement was something going on at the time. They used elements to let the viewers aware of the events happening at that time. One good example was in one of the scenes where Harry Flournoy found a book Willie Worsley had about Malcolm X. Willy then explained to him how he was involved with supporting and very involved following the Panthers, who were a political group around the time also fighting against racism and racial inequality. I believe the use of that subtle reference helped the viewers understand how harsh it was for young black men growing up around that time. One of the strongest and profound things shown in the film came at the end in the credits were the real former Texan and Kentucky players and coach (Dan Haskins) put in their own thought and feelings and reflected what it was like to be on the side of the black players where they faced adversity hate and discrimination for playing college basketball. Pat Riley which is a former Kentucky player at the time and now famous ex NBA player and now President for the Miami Heat, made an appearance and gave his intake of what it was like to see these events unfold through his perspective and gave praise for what the Texas Miners were able to accomplish historically. In conclusion, I feel overall the film made a big impact on me since I am a basketball fan and a fan of history

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