The DuSable Panthers

The weight of a season and the weight of growing up are burdens enough. For a high school basketball team in 1954, CHICAGO, the weight of history joined them every time they stepped onto the court. Long before "The Fab Five" there was "The Wonder Five". A team from DuSable High School, located in a predominantly Black area of Chicago's south side, a city with a harrowing record on race relations. It is also one of America's preeminent basketball cities. The Wonder Five's spectacular skill and immense poise carried them through the season and into the record books as the first all-Black team, led by a Black coach, to reach the highest levels of an organized, integrated, traditional sports program in America. When DuSable reached the finals in the Illinois state tournament, it made history when DuSable's five starters stepped onto the court. (Based on the book by Ira Berkow.)