Classic Entertainment: Sports Movies

Three of my favorite movies are hard to beat. As we enter high school and college sports season there is an excuse to watch them all once again. For football, the movie is Rudy, the true story about the Notre Dame walkon. For basketball, it is Hoosiers, the true story about the 1951 small town Indiana team. It still gets me when he is down to five players but plays with just four to teach the fifth boy a lesson. And for baseball, not so much of a sports story and not based on a true story, but a baseball setting in Fields of Dreams. This was Burt Lancaster's last movie. People still come to small town Dyersville, Iowa (also the home of Ertl toys/collectibles mentioned below) to see the baseball field in the corn field. Hoosiers stars Gene Hackman, another of my favorite actors. I think it is neat that these three movies, that are the top three on most best sports movies lists, are set in Indiana and Iowa where my parents and I are from. Speaking of Iowa, Sean Astin, who stars in Rudy, also stars in The Final Season, a true story about a small town Iowa baseball team. And for hockey fans another good one is Miracle on Ice about the 1980 USA gold medal hockey team. I can still remember sitting in the stands at my high school while watching my sister's varsity basketball game, which came before mine, when they announced the US win over the favored Russians. USA!