‘Victory’ Swats Cliches to Emerge a Winner

John Larroquette parlays his customary self-absorbed, ne’er-do-well image into a winning performance as a basketball coach who learns to grow up guiding a developmentally disabled Special Olympics team in “One Special Victory” (at 9 p.m. Sunday on Channels 4, 36 and 39).

The show steamrollers its cliches under the frantic and bumptious Larroquette, who even breaks down with a genuine crying jag at one point. Deft contributions also come from the actors playing the impaired athletes (only one of whom is disabled in real life).

A real estate salesman who can’t do anything right or even honestly, the slick Larroquette character, in quick order, loses his wife, his job and his house. But that’s not all: A brush with the law nets him 50 hours of community service and an assignment to whip into shape for the Special Olympics a team that needs a miracle.

Larroquette, after some tribulations, brings the squad to the finals and discovers something about winning and losing in the process. Director Stuart Cooper and scenarist Betty Goldberg (in a story suggested by the book “The B-Team--A Team That Couldn’t Lose” by Ron Jones) are interested in a light and easy chokehold on a viewer’s emotions and, basically, they succeed.

The five actors playing the physically and emotionally impaired characters win you over with an appealing earnestness. Actor Joseph Asaro, as the grinning character Spike who can’t talk, is really developmentally disabled. That notwithstanding, it’s his performance that wins your heart. Ray Walston and Beah Richards have quixotic supporting roles.