The ‘Point Break’ star almost played point guard in the 1992 basketball classic

Wesley Snipes jumped at the chance to make sure that Woody Harrelson — and not Keanu Reeves — starred opposite him in White Men Can’t Jump.

After making a sports movie classic with 1988’s Bull Durham, writer-director Ron Shelton knew that to do the same with White Men Can’t Jump, he had to find legit ballers for his 1992 basketball flick. So, he set up weeks of pick-up games. “I just threw a ball out there,” he previously shared. “That sort of weeded it out. Agents would call asking about their clients, and I’d say, ‘He can’t play. He can’t beat me, never mind these guys.’”

Among those to participate in these runs were Snipes, Harrelson and Reeves, all stars on the rise. “Everybody who was anybody at the time and [everybody who] wanted to be somebody were all there for this audition,” Snipes said.

Despite the talk of needing someone with real basketball skills, Snipes overcame his own lackluster jump shot to earn the role of fast-talking Sidney Deane. “Wesley is not a great basketball player, but he is a great athlete — big distinction,” Shelton explained. “When he showed up to audition, he just had more attitude than anybody. He walked on the court trash-talking, and it didn’t matter if he had any game. He showed up with more attitude and less jump shot than anybody.”

Snipes doesn’t disagree. “I had great handles, great passing, great defense, but every shot I took was a brick,” Snipes admitted with a laugh. “Every time I shot it, even if it didn’t go in, I talked like it did. I made you believe that you were lucky it didn’t go in.”

For Sidney’s sidekick Billy Hoyle, two of the most prominent names in the mix were Harrelson, who was starring on Cheers, and Reeves, who boasted a much longer film résumé between Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Point Break. But Harrelson had a bigger asset in his corner: Snipes, his former co-star on the 1986 football comedy Wildcats. So, when Snipes and Reeves were paired for a read-through, Snipes did his old pal a favor.

”[Reeves] would improvise and say something where there would be a natural response from me, and I just left him out there like dirty laundry,” Snipes previously admitted.

It was probably for the best, considering Shelton described the future John Wick star as a “hard worker” but “not a basketball player.”

“Woody and Wesley had magic instantly,” Shelton said. “Woody’s a great counterpuncher. Wesley could come up with a funny line, and Woody could steal the moment with his reaction. That’s the key to chemistry, and you don’t get it very often. You need two people who can’t do what the other one does.”

A slam dunk duo, indeed.