We just watched the documentary “More Than a Game” — the story of LeBron James and his highschool teammates.  The film covers everything from their start as 4 best friends on an 11 yr old AAU basketball team all the way through their senior year and third state championship (beating the Nation’s #1 team Oak Hill Academy along the way).

The director/creator of the film started it as a college project (the original assignment was a 10 minute short).  He was from Akron and had heard about this local group of kids who started playing together at a young age and decided to all play for the same highschool.  The coach and highschool administrators allowed him to follow the team their junior and senior year as a fly-on-wall cameraman.  He does an excellent job of capturing the essence of the team as a unit, each player’s story (not just LeBron), and their mentor coach (the point guard’s father).

I purchased the movie on Amazon.com and expected to learn a lot about LeBron James intermixed with a highlight reel of game footage.  What I got instead was a wholesome story of friendship, family, and sports as a catalyst for something greater than “the game”.

While we weren’t state champions or anything, some of my fondest memories and closest friends were made on my highschool basketball team (and thanks to Facebook, I can stay in touch with them).  I think Tia liked the film as well, she also played sports in highschool (and college).  “More Than a Game” highlights many of the character-building aspects of sports which makes me hope our kids enjoy athletics as much as their parents do.