The Fab Five

The Fab Five is a 2011 ESPN Films documentary about the 1990s Michigan Wolverines men's basketball players known collectively as the Fab Five: Chris Webber, Jalen Rose, Juwan Howard, Jimmy King, and Ray Jackson. It chronicles the recruitment, glory years, notorious time-out fiasco, cultural impact and the scandal that followed these players who are described as iconic figures in the media. The film originally aired on March 13, 2011, on a national broadcast on ESPN. On its original airing, the film drew 2.7 million viewers, setting a record as the highest-rated ESPN documentary ever. The film spawned critical commentary in a broad spectrum of media outlets which include leading newspapers such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post; leading periodicals such as Forbes; online forums such as Slate; and leading news outlets such as MSNBC. In particular, the film sparked a verbal war between Jalen Rose and Duke University's Grant Hill through the media regarding issues of race in sports and education that fueled the Duke–Michigan basketball rivalry. Coincidentally, the following week, the 2011 editions of Michigan and Duke met in the third round of the 2011 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament; Duke won, 73–71. Story Previously Mitch Albom had chronicled the Fab Five in a book entitled Fab Five: Basketball, Trash Talk, The American Dream, and Fox Sports had attempted to review the group. The press regarded this as the first complete recounting of the fabled group. Rose describes this film as "almost like the Bible of the Fab Five Story". An ESPN commentator describes the five players as the greatest incoming college basketball recruiting class ever. He notes that they were presented to the world as the embodiment of what was wrong with college sports because they wore revolutionary baggy shorts and black socks and blasted hip-hop music while talking a lot of trash. The film documents the "formation, rise, scandal and epilogue of the team". It documents the 1991–92 and 1992–93 teams, the University of Michigan basketball scandal, and related off the court issues such as hate mail. Forbes notes that the legacy of the quintet, which includes successive appearances in the championship game of the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship, was overshadowed by the scandal, which necessitated the removal of Final Four banners and vacating of games.