Fang Shi-jie grows up an orphan inside a strict kung fu school, where the stern principal uses him as a daily punching bag to demonstrate discipline and strength. When he finally tests the Shaolin iron vest (iron shirt) technique to dull the blows, the principal still sends him out onto the streets for a night without dinner. In a street demonstration, Shi-jie shows astonishing accuracy by tossing cans into a bin from almost ten metres away, impressing a down-and-out hustler named Wang Li. Wang Li lays down a challenge: if Shi-jie can throw a coin into his mouth from twenty metres away, he’ll buy him dinner.
They head to a five-star French restaurant, where Wang Li’s daughter works, and it’s there that Lily convinces Shi-jie to help them make some money. After a meal that leaves them with leftovers, they head to a casino owned by one of Wang Li’s old friends, Brother Hu. Shi-jie wins hundreds of dollars playing darts, but the celebration triggers a fight that causes thousands of dollars in damage. The next morning, Bi Tianhao, the principal of Fireball University, places the kung fu school’s principal on his payroll, and Shi-jie is beaten by Bi Tianhao’s thugs and expelled from the school.
That night, Shi-jie returns to the park bench where he first met Wang Li, who is still waiting there. On the pretext of helping him search for his family, Wang Li invites him to join First University as the new star of its basketball team. Meanwhile, Wang Li taps into media attention around Shi-jie to turn the story into money through interviews and news articles.
After joining the basketball team, Shi-jie discovers that Lily is Ting Wei’s sister, and Ting Wei is the team’s captain, which heightens the stakes as Shi-jie tries to win her attention. He finds himself pitting his growing basketball prowess against Xiao Lan, Lily’s idol, and the rivalry creates tension within the team. With guidance from Ting Wei, the team becomes more cohesive, and Shi-jie begins to blend his kung-fu foundations with basketball techniques, letting his unique skills shine and helping the team win several rounds of the inter-varsity tournament.
By the finals, the major rival is Li Tian’s Fireball University, a squad led by Li Tian. The Fireball team is described as containing players who had been banned from all basketball games in Japan, and the match is marred by bribery of the referee. The opposing team employs a range of dirty tricks and the referee interferes, even punching out the last ball that Shi-jie throws. Refusing to accept this injustice, Shi-jie recalls a technique from his first teacher and turns back the clock to the moment just before his final throw. Given a second chance, he passes to Ting Wei, who dunks the ball past Li Tian, securing a hard-fought victory for First University.
After the win, Shi-jie learns that his father is the richest man in Asia and visits him, only to discover that he was abandoned for safety during a financial crisis. His father urges him to go to London to broaden his future, but Shi-jie chooses to stay with Wang Li, who then suggests aiming for an even greater stage—the Olympic Games.
