Movies like Gridiron Gang (2006)
The best movies like Gridiron Gang (2006) are Any Given Sunday (1999), The Express (2008) and The Longest Yard (2005). If Gridiron Gang hooked you with its crime and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedRemember the Titans (2000)7.7/10 from 3,135 votes
- NewestThe Senior (2025)Released 2025
Any Given Sunday (1999)
A star quarterback gets knocked out of the game and an unknown third stringer is called in to replace him. The unknown gives a stunning performance and forces the aging coach to reevaluate his game plans and life. A new co-owner/president adds to the pressure of winning. The new owner must prove herself in a male dominated world.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Express (2008)
Follow the inspirational life of college football hero Ernie Davis, the first African-American to win the Heisman Trophy.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Longest Yard (2005)
Disgraced pro football quarterback Paul Crewe lands in a Texas federal penitentiary, where manipulative Warden Hazen recruits him to advise the institution's football team of prison guards. Crewe suggests a tune-up game which lands him quarterbacking a crew of inmates in a game against the guards. Aided by incarcerated ex-NFL coach and player Nate Scarborough, Crewe and his team must overcome not only the bloodthirstiness of the opposition, but also the corrupt warden trying to fix the game against them.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & crime
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisInvincible (2006)
Inspired by the true story of Vince Papale, a man with nothing to lose who ignored the staggering odds and made his dream come true. When the coach of Papale's beloved hometown football team hosted an unprecedented open tryout, the public consensus was that it was a waste of time – no one good enough to play professional football was going to be found this way.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFriday Night Lights (2004)
A small, turbulent town in Texas obsesses over their high school football team to an unhealthy degree. When the star tailback, Boobie Miles, is seriously injured during the first game of the season, all hope is lost, and the town's dormant social problems begin to flare up. It is left to the inspiring abilities of new coach Gary Gaines to instill in the other team members -- and, by proxy, the town itself -- a sense of self-respect and honor.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhen the Game Stands Tall (2014)
A young coach turns a losing high school football program around to go undefeated for 12 consecutive seasons.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCarter High (2015)
The true story of four student athletes from Carter High School in Dallas, Texas in the 1980s, whose bright futures irrevocably changed due to their off-field activities.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Draft Day (2014)
At the NFL Draft, general manager Sonny Weaver has the opportunity to rebuild his team when he trades for the number one pick. He must decide what he's willing to sacrifice on a life-changing day for a few hundred young men with NFL dreams.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRudy (1993)
Rudy grew up in a steel mill town where most people ended up working, but wanted to play football at Notre Dame instead. There were only a couple of problems. His grades were a little low, his athletic skills were poor, and he was only half the size of the other players. But he had the drive and the spirit of 5 people and has set his sights upon joining the team.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMy All American (2015)
Freddie Steinmark, an underdog on the gridiron, faces the toughest challenge of his life after leading his team to a championship season.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Program (1993)
Several players from different backgrounds try to cope with the pressures of playing football at a major university. Each deals with the pressure differently, some turn to drinking, others to drugs, and some to studying.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWe Are Marshall (2006)
When a plane crash claims the lives of members of the Marshall University football team and some of its fans, the team's new coach and his surviving players try to keep the football program alive.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRemember the Titans (2000)
After leading his football team to 15 winning seasons, coach Bill Yoast is demoted and replaced by Herman Boone – tough, opinionated and as different from the beloved Yoast as he could be. The two men learn to overcome their differences and turn a group of hostile young men into champions.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSafety (2020)
The story of Ray-Ray McElrathbey, a freshman football player for Clemson University, who secretly raised his younger brother on campus after his home life became too unsteady.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Senior (2025)
At 59, Mike Flynt may be too old to be on a college football field, but not too old to feel the weight of unfinished business. After nearly four decades, he returns to his alma mater to take the hit that changed everything. Bruised, doubted, and nearly broken, he pushes for one more game, not for glory, but for the teammates he lost, the family he fractured, and the ending he still believes is possible.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
The 5th Quarter (2010)
In the wake of a car crash that killed his brother, football player Jon Abbate leads his school's struggling team to its most successful season ever.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Stick It (2006)
Haley is a naturally gifted athlete but, with her social behavior, the teen seems intent on squandering her abilities. After a final brush with the law, a judge sentences her to an elite gymnastics academy run by a legendary, hard-nosed coach. Once there, Haley's rebellious attitude wins her both friends and enemies.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Junction Boys (2002)
Tom Berenger leads an outstanding cast in this bone-crunching dramatization of legendary college football coach Paul "Bear" Bryant's debut at Texas A&M in the summer of 1954. The often unnerving story finds Bryant ducking the school's good ol' boy network of rich, influential alumni by spiriting his new team away to a makeshift training base in a tiny town called Junction. There, Bryant runs the equivalent of a POW camp, brutalizing an oversized, underdeveloped bunch of rowdy young men and tormenting those who seek medical attention for cracked spines and deadly heat exhaustion. Berenger delivers a warts-and-all performance as the vulgar, monstrous, yet much-respected Bryant, and the direction by seasoned television vet Mike Robe is brisk and almost explosively charged. Whatever one thinks of Bryant's punishing methods, the film does not flinch from telling its powerful tale. --Tom Keogh
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
The Blind Side (2009)
The story of Michael Oher, a homeless and traumatized boy who became an All American football player and first round NFL draft pick with the help of a caring woman and her family.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisHalf Nelson (2006)
Despite his dedication to the junior-high students who fill his classroom, idealistic teacher Dan Dunne leads a secret life of addiction that the majority of his students will never know. But things change when a troubled student Drey makes a startling discovery of his secret life, causing a tenuous bond between the two that could either end disastrously or provide a catalyst of hope.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCoach Carter (2005)
Based on a true story, in which Richmond High School head basketball coach Ken Carter made headlines in 1999 for benching his undefeated team due to poor academic results.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisForever Strong (2008)
Hotshot rugby player Rick Penning was the star player of his Arizona high school team until a fateful brush with the law forces him to ponder the consequences of his actions in a Salt Lake City juvenile detention center.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCrooked Arrows (2012)
A native-American lacrosse team makes its way through a prep school league tournament.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPride (2007)
Coach Jim Ellis shocks the community and changes lives when, aided by a local janitor, he sets out to form Philadelphia's first black swim team. But the odds are against them as they battle rigid rules, racism and more.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHardball (2001)
An aimless young man who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAbove the Rim (1994)
Story of a promising high school basketball star and his relationships with two brothers, one a drug dealer and the other a former basketball star fallen on hard times and now employed as a security guard.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGreen Street Hooligans 2 (2009)
Following the deadly climax of "Green Street Hooligans," several members of the West Ham firm and numerous members of Millwall end up in jail. The GSE quickly discover the brutality of life on the inside, as they are constant targets of the superior numbers and better-financed Millwall crew.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisJamesy Boy (2014)
Based on the true story of teenager James Burns who goes from a suburban street gang to a maximum-security prison cell surrounded by hardened criminals. He turns his life around in prison thanks to the unexpected friendship he forms with a convicted murderer who becomes his mentor.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both crime & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRebound: The Legend of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (1996)
A dramatization of the life of Earl 'The Goat' Manigault (Don Cheadle), with a lot of factual based occurrences. A reformed junkie returns from prison to clean up his act and devote the rest of his life to the young kids of Harlem. 1996 was the 25th anniversary of the first tournament named after him.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCadence (1990)
As punishment for drunken, rebellious behavior, a young white soldier is thrown into a stockade populated entirely by black inmates. But instead of falling victim to racial hatred, the soldier joins forces with his fellow prisoners and rises up against the insanely tyrannical and bigoted prison warden.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Gridiron Gang?
The closest matches to Gridiron Gang are Any Given Sunday (1999), The Express (2008) and The Longest Yard (2005). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Gridiron Gang?
People who watched Gridiron Gang most often go on to Any Given Sunday (1999), The Express (2008) and The Longest Yard (2005).
What is the highest-rated movie like Gridiron Gang?
Remember the Titans (2000), rated 7.7/10 by 3,135 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Gridiron Gang?
The Senior (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Gridiron Gang?
Yes: Any Given Sunday (1999), The Express (2008) and The Longest Yard (2005).
How are movies similar to Gridiron Gang chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Gridiron Gang, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.