Rivals

Sakuragi has a few rivals in both anime and movies and his rivals are similar to his personality as well as his troublemaking antics and being fouled out in the game with the exception of Fukuda who outplays him in the first half of the game against Ryonan.

 

Koichirou Rango

Rango is the center player from team Tsukubu during the second movie. Rango meets Sakuragi after gaining a crush towards Haruko who practices basketball all by herself as he saves her ball by shooting the basketball dunk while in a motorcycle helmet. They started their rivalry when Sakuragi angrily headbutts him after seeing him had a crush on Haruko as he also headbutts him in retaliation after Sakuragi's friends discovered that Rango is able to withstand Sakuragi's headbutt just like both Rukawa and Akagi. During the best of 8 game before facing Shoyo, He makes fun out of Sakuragi while he's on the bench and later when he replaces Kogure to play the game, He and Sakuragi are seen bickering when they wanted to face Rukawa after the latter calls them two idiots. Sakuragi manages to get another rebound but knocking Rango to the ground results him in getting a fifth foul and ends up being fouled out. In the end of the movie, Rango congratulates them for winning as Haruko arrives to praise Sakuragi's team victory as both ends up fighting each other just for Haruko. Sakuragi also calls him as the "Golden-Haired Monkey" before team Tsukubu takes their time-out.

 

Nobunaga Kiyota

Kiyota is another rival to Sakuragi and his troublemaking antics and his personality closely resembles to him in which he calls Sakuragi as the "Red-Haired Monkey" as the latter calls him as the "Wild Monkey". Both characters shared the same jersey #10 but their positions in playing basketball are different. They are trying to make a rival towards Rukawa. However, their antics cause both captains Akagi and Maki punch them to their heads and they apologized for the embarassment of both of their teams before the start of their basketball match. This also happens after the national eliminations in Kanagawa, where Sakuragi joins up with him and Maki to watch a basketball match between both Meioh and Aiwa in Aichi as both are seen bickering with each other when they met. Later after Meioh wins against Aiwa, he and Sakuragi are booing at Hiroshi Morishige and his teammates for their victory.

Kicchou Fukuda

Fukuda became Sakuragi's rival when he wanted to challenge him to a basketball match by convincing one of his friends to challenge him but the latter refuses by headbutting them due to his depression after their loss against Kainan. In the match against Ryonan, he and Sakuragi challenged to a loop-sided match resulting in the 1st half where Sakuragi attempts to stop him for an alley-oop but failed as he was knocked off the ground. He tells him that he won and his injured forehead continues to bleed before they take him back on the bench. In the 2nd half, a persistent Sakuragi retaliates and managed to contain him though it was just settled in the practice match between Shohoku and the combined team of Shoyo and Ryonan.

 

Hiroshi Morishige

Morishige is the super rookie from Meihou High School and also similar to Sakuragi who is also being fouled out in the game due to his physical immense strength and clumsiness of getting a technical foul when he's hanging on the ring after bumping both Aiwa players with a massive slam dunk. This raises Sakuragi's fighting spirit who wanted to challenge him after watching his match against Aiwa. In his case, he causes him to injure Aiwa's ace, Dai Moroboshi during their match due to his physical immense strength. After the game, Sakuragi intentionally bumps him (to test his physical strength) but ended getting knocked down on the ground, which raised his fighting spirit even more. Because of this, he became one of Sakuragi's goals in the Nationals, though their respective teams never met.