Was Snake Plissken's basketball game possible?

General Questions
#1

In Escape from LA, Snake Plissken is captures and put on the basketball court of death!! (dun dun dunnnnn). To survive, he has to make five baskets on opposing sides of the court on a 10 second shot clock. Naturally he does it, with the last basket being a full court throw.

I am not a basketball fan and don’t know much about the game, but given Snake was at half court by shot 4 and full court by shot 5, is this about how such an event would play out, or is it possible to get the job done with much better positioning? In short, just how incredible was Snake?

Video link here.

#2

Well, he did it with one eye, so his depth perception was limited…soooo, pretty incredible?

#3

I would say “within the realm of possibility.” Half-court shots can be made, but seldom tried because the odds are so bad. Full-court shots are sometimes attempted when time is short, but rarely made. It does happen, though.

To my eye, Snake was at least at 3/4 court, and he wasted some seconds to build drama, seconds he could have spent getting closer.

#4

I don’t know that depth perception would be much of a factor at that distance.

More important to his success in the challenge is that the shot clock had apparently been tampered with. It took ninety-two seconds to count down to zero.

#5

Didn’t he have something wrong with one of his legs (stabbed in the thigh, or something)?

#6

I was going to say the same thing. In a couple of spots they put it in slow-mo to give you the illusion that there was a stylistic reason why it took so long.

#7

The shots are all possible, but the time is impossible. A regulation basketball court is just short of 30 meters (28 m international, 94 ft NBA). A world-class sprint time for 30 meters is over 3.5 seconds. Just running back and forth for three shots takes up more than 10 seconds, not even counting time for reversing direction, retrieving the ball, or shooting. And Snake wasn’t exactly running at Usain Bolt speeds.

#8

He gets 10 seconds per shot, which resets once a shot goes in. So roughly 50 seconds for roughly 150 meters. It looks to me like the time limit actually allows for 5 layups, rather than needing to take any long shots. So it might be on the easier side of possible.

#9

Huh. In that case, I think the shot clock runs fast in places, not slow. He should have had more time than 3 second for that last shot.

#10

I’m kinda curious to know if anyone’s ever tried it. Couldn’t find it on YouTube or people bragging about it on Google, which seemed strange. Never mind Plissken’s feat, could a good basketball player even pull it off, or do you just end up to far from the baskets at the end so a half/full court shot is required making the chances of success remote?

#11

Exactly. You can even hear the crowd counting down from ten in French each shot, and the shot clock goes off several times when he makes a few buzzer-beaters, indicating time ran down to 0, before being reset to 10 when the shot went in. It does seem to me like there’s a lot more drama than there should be for a reseting 10-second shot clock from each side of the court, unless he really muffs getting the ball after it goes in.

#12

It’s been re-done. I can’t hear the sound here at work, but this purports to show it’s not all that hard, if you’re not in a death pit on LA island.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qVwAYtf-ag