Last year's 90s sensation 'Respond 1997' is returning with the basketball glory years of Lee Sang-min, Woo Ji-won, etc.

A close source revealed during a phone interview that tvN, the cable channel that produced '1997,' has decided on the theme of basketball for the second season of the show. "Writers of the show are gathering information on 1990s basketball from avid fans who lived through those years," he commented. The producer and the main screenwriter from season one have reunited and are in full swing in preparation for the highly anticipated second season.

Rumor has it that a big factor in selecting basketball as the theme of the show was that producer Shin and writer Lee are both classes of 1994, a period when basketball and Seotaeji created an unprecedented sensation that swept across the nation.

1994 was the first year that a college basketball team won the championship trophy at the national basketball tournament. Back then, Yonsei University had large followings similar to what we see with idol artist groups nowadays. So it was a huge deal. Such popularity with basketball led to the production of "The Last Battle" featuring Jang Dong-gun and Shim En-ha as well as the inauguration of professional basketball league, KBL.

Originally, season one was set in 1994. But when Eun Ji-won, a member of Sech's Kiss, was cast, the time period was moved to 1997. "Return 1997" brought about nostalgia of the late 90s as the show depicted the first wave of K-pop, most notably H.O.T. and Sech's Kiss, in the happenings of a local high school.