[BillyMac]

The athletes of the WNBA are the best of the best, and their league has a supportive pregnancy policy. Not every athlete is so lucky. Take Darnellia Russell, a high school player in a new documentary about a girls' basketball team from Seattle.

In "The Heart of the Game," directed by Ward Serrill, the Roosevelt High Roughriders are stuck in the losing column until tax professor and novice coach Bill Resler walks into their lives. He gives them permission to be competitive and ruthless on the court allowing the team to thrive. When Darnellia enrolls and walks into the gym, Coach Resler, a father of daughters, smells her talent. The team's wins pile up, even with Darnellia playing most of her junior year pregnant without knowing it.

Darnellia gave birth to her daughter Trekayla in December 2002. When she tried to return to the team as a senior, she had too few academic credits to play because of missed school during her pregnancy. She made up the credits, yet still was denied eligibility under Washington state rules that govern high school athletics -- her pregnancy was not a "hardship," a designation that would allow her to make up the credits and qualify. Darnellia had hoped, through an athletic scholarship, to fulfill her dream of becoming the first in her family to go to college. She had letters of interest from a number of schools before she got pregnant. After the baby the interest pretty much disappeared, and with it, Darnellia's dreams of a college education and maybe even the WNBA.