A Fifth Season

The NCAA suspends St. Ignatius basketball coach Chris DiMarro for gambling. He visits his parents, and while there his father dies, and he stays on to get his mother's financial affairs in order. His fiancée, Bonnie Grant, having to postpone their wedding date, breaks their engagement. She accepts a medical assignment with the Peace Corps, but does not tell him where it is. He engages in a relentless search for her, tracks her down in Tanzania, and finds that she is married to a doctor coworker. Chris visits a game park with Bonnie, and is shot by poachers. She takes him to the clinic where she works, and her husband treats his injury. Tensions develop between them.


Back in the States, Chris is off suspension, and his team is winning and gaining national recognition, yet his life is in turmoil. He fights for custody of his out-of-wedlock son after the mother is murdered. He clashes with the college's athletic director, Father Anthony Grasso, who's a racist and who also circumvented admission regulations to get an athlete accepted in the college. The basketball season comes to a close, the team gets a post-season tournament berth, and Chris finds out that his guard has been tested for the AIDS virus.


St. Ignatius makes it to the final round in the tournament. If they win the next game, Chris could be going up against his former college coach for the championship. Disaster strikes and his dream is destroyed.