Looking like a Mormon version of Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, this amateur-sports film set in an LDS basketball league features all the clichés of a ragtag team vs. a polished machine, but does so with a gentle sense of humor that saves it from being truly awful.
With the church calling an end to the violent (yes, these Mormons play dirty) league, Bishop Linderman (Willard) orders Dennis (Wilson) to bring home the championship trophy to go alongside the team's only other award: a plaque for best uniforms won 20 years ago. Naturally, the Mud Lake team is comprised of misfits: a fat player, a man with a heart condition, another who keeps fouling out for swearing and Gary Coleman.
Their only hope lies in convincing Jeremiah (Ellsworth) to rejoin the league, despite his having missed the game-winning shot in a previous championship and then getting screwed when the church got him into a house that turned out to be beset with problems.
Along the way, Dennis seeks help from NBA vet Thurl Bailey, playing an inner-city basketball coach, and from the coach's bizarre playbook, all in hopes of upsetting the top-seeded Crystal Hills team, led by the alpha-male Bracken brothers (Curt Dousett and Larry Bagby).
It's not giving anything away to say that the Mud Lakes will train hard in montage sequences, meet various obstacles and win in the final seconds. As with all such stories, the enjoyment is in the angles and nuances Hale brings to the screen.
In what is clearly an evolving trend in Mormon cinema, Hale underplays the religious aspects in favor of stronger narrative. References to the religion's dictates are done with a wink, and the message that sports should be more about becoming a better person than about winning wouldn't be out of place in any other athletic-underdog tale. Which is part of the problem. Hale doesn't bring anything new to the court, and the result is a pleasant enough film that fails to make that final drive to the basket.