Blue Chips

Pete Bell coaches college basketball at Western University, and his team is in decline. The players he has are willing but limited, and the top high school prospects are being lured elsewhere with money, a practice the college rules forbid. Under pressure to win and unable to compete for talent by legal means, Pete faces a dilemma between his belief in fair play and the compromises that success seems to require.

William Friedkin directed the film, the eighth of the sixteen features he made, following The Guardian and preceding Jailbreakers. Ron Shelton wrote the screenplay, Michele Rappaport produced, and Nick Nolte leads the cast as Pete. Shaquille O'Neal appears as Neon, with Mary McDonnell, Ed O'Neill, J.T. Walsh and Alfre Woodard among the credited cast of ninety-four.

The film was released in February 1994 and runs 108 minutes. Made for a budget of about 35 million dollars, it took in roughly 23 million worldwide. On IMDb it holds a 6.3 rating from around 16,000 votes, while on TMDB it sits at 6.1 from just over 200 votes. A critics' score of 5.7 from twenty-nine reviews places it below both audience figures, though not by a wide margin, suggesting a mixed response across the board.