Rukawa learns something about Coach Anzai that makes him determined to become Japan's best high school basketball player. Then, while the Shohoku team goes to practice with another team in the ten days before the beginning of the national tournament, Sakuragi stays behind for special practice sessions that will push him to the limit and hone his skills.
Shohoku, trailing Ryonan in the final seconds of the game, has the opportunity to beat their rival when Hanamichi blocks a shot, giving Kaede Rukawa a chance at shooting the winning basket.
Sakuragi gets a break when Coach Anzai decides to give him a crack at playing center, but, with only three days before the game against Takezato, that means a gruelling training regimen of five hundred shots a day.
Sakuragi Hanamichi tries to leave his bad-boy image behind and start anew on the school's basketball team, but when he does not see eye-to-eye with the team's captain, he struggles to stay on the right path.
Hanamichi finally has a chance to prove himself on the basketball court when he is allowed to play in the place of Akagi, who is injured, but his efforts might not be enough to make him the next team captain.
Patrice, a skilled basketball player whose mother is an alcoholic, does not feel like she has anyone she can trust after Deena bullies her and keeps her from sitting with Akil, Marcel, and Tre, but Akil shows Patrice that she can count on him.
Dramatizes the true story of Coach Don Haskins of Texas Western University who, in the 1965-66 season, bucked convention and consequences to introduce the first all-African-American starting lineup in the history of college basketball.
Wracked with discipline and family problems, Tokyo's Johnan High School basketball team faces the big game against Nango Daitsukuba High in the national championships--the team that knocked them out of the tournament in the first round last year.
