40 Fun Facts About Coach (TV Series)

Which SpongeBob SquarePants character is voiced by Bill Fagerbakke, who played assistant coach Dauber on Coach?

Patrick Star has been Fagerbakke's voice role across the whole SpongeBob franchise. Sitcom viewers met him again as Marshall's father Marvin on How I Met Your Mother.

Which actor, who played Steve Freeling in the horror film Poltergeist, starred as head coach Hayden Fox on Coach?

Craig T. Nelson won the 1992 Emmy for lead actor in a comedy as Hayden Fox. He also stepped behind the camera, directing many episodes of the show himself.

Luther Van Dam fears a famous curse on Coach after Hayden Fox appears on the cover of which magazine?

Sports Illustrated has a legendary cover jinx, said to bring bad luck to whoever appears there. Hayden earned the cover by starting the season with a top-ranked team.

Luther Van Dam plans to spend his life savings at a Las Vegas memorabilia auction devoted to which singer on Coach?

Elvis Presley is Luther's idol throughout the series. In the finale's epilogue he retires and builds a Graceland-style manor as a tribute.

Which NFL quarterback does Hayden Fox try to talk into donating sperm after tiring of fertility treatments on Coach?

Troy Aikman plays himself in the episode, titled The Stand-In. The quarterback spent all 12 of his NFL seasons with the Dallas Cowboys.

What nickname do Hayden Fox's Minnesota State players carry on Coach, shared with the US Army's 101st Airborne Division?

Screaming Eagles was the show's invention: the real Minnesota State in Mankato fields the Mavericks. No school officially held the Minnesota State name while the series was on the air.

What is Christine Armstrong's job when she begins dating Hayden Fox in the early seasons of Coach?

TV news anchor Christine works in the Twin Cities, so she and Hayden begin as a long-distance couple. He is often heard heading off to visit her there.

Which actor, the younger brother of a famous sitcom star, played assistant coach Luther Van Dam on Coach?

Jerry Van Dyke earned four Emmy nominations as the befuddled Luther. He had made his television acting debut on his brother Dick's sitcom, playing Rob Petrie's brother Stacey.

Which actress played Christine on Coach, decades after topping the Billboard Hot 100 with the song Johnny Angel?

Shelley Fabares earned two Emmy nominations as Christine. Her chart-topper dated from 1962, when she was a teenage star of The Donna Reed Show.

Which star of the sitcom Soap joined Coach for its last two seasons as the eccentric owner of Hayden Fox's NFL team?

Katherine Helmond played team owner Doris Sherman, a recent widow keener on gimmicks than football. She was also Debra's mother on Everybody Loves Raymond.

Which fictional NFL expansion team hires Hayden Fox as head coach for the final two seasons of Coach?

Orlando Breakers shared a name with the old USFL side that played in Boston, New Orleans and Portland. Nearly the whole Minnesota State crew followed Hayden to Florida, his assistants included.

Hayden Fox's NFL team reaches the playoffs in the final season of Coach, where it meets which real team?

Buffalo Bills were the opponents, and Luther's love of chicken wings gave the team food poisoning right before the game. A year earlier Hayden's side had finished at the bottom of the league.

Coach creator Barry Kemp had earlier created which CBS sitcom about an author running a Vermont inn?

Newhart lasted eight seasons on CBS, and Kemp topped it with nine seasons of Coach on ABC. He had learned the trade writing for Taxi.

Hayden Fox was named for Hayden Fry, longtime football coach at which university, the alma mater of Coach's creator?

Iowa also stands in for Minnesota State on screen: the campus and stadium exteriors were filmed in Iowa City, where creator Barry Kemp had studied.

Who won a contest in the early 1990s to record the Coach theme and then appeared in the opening credits?

A college marching band took the prize, and its recording stayed as the theme until the series ended. The tune itself was by John Morris, who scored many Mel Brooks films.

Which comedy veteran won a guest-actor Emmy for playing Kenny Montague, the gardener Hayden Fox fires on Coach?

Tim Conway won for the 1996 episode The Gardener, then came back as the hopeless Kenny a year later. He took the same award again in 2008 for 30 Rock.

ABC made Coach the lead-in to which sports broadcast in season seven, scrambling its West Coast airtimes?

Monday Night Football kicked off at 6 pm on the West Coast, so viewers there saw the sitcom after the game instead of before it. ABC moved the show to Wednesdays before the season was out.

Coach struggled in the ratings until ABC gave it the time slot directly after which hit sitcom?

Roseanne proved the right neighbour: ratings improved after the move and Coach ran until 1997. The actress cast as Christine said she took the part to play a successful, ambitious woman.

What is the name of Hayden Fox's daughter, who enrolls at Minnesota State to be near her father on Coach?

Kelly had been raised mostly by her mother, so college was her chance to know her dad. He spends the early seasons struggling to accept that his little girl has grown up.

Hayden Fox's prank-war rival Judy Watkins coaches which Minnesota State team on Coach?

Women's basketball coach Judy is Hayden's archenemy, which turns awkward when Dauber falls for her. She was played by stand-up comedian Pam Stone.

What job does the fussy, budget-conscious Howard Burleigh hold at Minnesota State on Coach?

Athletic director Howard is Hayden's boss, yet he and his cheerful wife Shirley become the Foxes' close friends. Kenneth Kimmins played him from the first season to the last.

Which Mary Tyler Moore Show regular appears on Coach as Howard Burleigh's cheerful wife Shirley?

Georgia Engel played Shirley from 1991 to the end of the run. At one point Howard hires her as his secretary, to his regret.

What kind of home does Hayden Fox live in during his Minnesota State years, and retire to in the Coach finale?

A cabin by a lake is where Hayden is happiest, and Luther once plans to buy the one next door to prove his friendship.

What do Hayden and Christine Fox do late in Coach's run after being unable to conceive a child?

They adopt a baby boy named Timothy, a role shared on screen by twins. Many final-season episodes turn on the couple's new-found joy in parenthood.

Hayden Fox cannot stand the theater student his daughter marries on Coach; what kind of performer is Stuart Rosebrock?

A mime artist was about the last son-in-law a football man wanted. The marriage ended when Stuart came home from filming a kids' TV show and announced he had met another woman.

Where does Hayden Fox's daughter move on Coach when an advertising agency hires her after graduation?

New York all but took her out of the show: after the move she was seen only in occasional guest spots. On one visit home Hayden finds her a changed woman, and is not sure he approves.

Which former Dallas Cowboys head coach does Hayden Fox try to befriend on Coach in the hope of landing an NFL job?

Jimmy Johnson plays himself, one of many real football figures to drop by. Mike Ditka, Lou Holtz and Hank Stram also turned up as themselves over the years.

Which Hall of Fame Chicago Bears linebacker plays himself on Coach, taking over as Hayden Fox's defensive coordinator?

Dick Butkus is hired when Luther is promoted to general manager, and promptly starts taking over the team. Years earlier he had been a guest at Hayden's bachelor roast.

How does Hayden Fox propose to Christine in the fifth-season opener of Coach?

On live television made it a proposal she could hardly duck. Reaching the altar took longer: later that season the couple were in Las Vegas taking another shot at getting married.

Which pet of Luther Van Dam's bites Hayden Fox on Coach, putting the whole coaching staff into quarantine?

A monkey was not Luther's first biter: his dog Quincy once faced being put down for sinking his teeth into Riley Pringle, a prickly Minnesota State colleague.

Which Saturday Night Live comedian plays Leonard Kraleman, a misfit student Hayden Fox advises on Coach?

Rob Schneider was a guest around the time he joined the sketch show's on-screen cast. Hayden's advice ends with the nerdy Leonard trying out for the football team.

Mimi Bobeck turns up as a rival bidder in a 1997 Coach crossover; which ABC sitcom was her home series?

The Drew Carey Show lent Mimi to an ABC crossover night themed around Las Vegas. Grace Under Fire and Ellen joined the same stunt, and Drew himself appeared in the Coach episode.

Which network ordered 13 episodes of a Coach sequel in 2015, only to cancel it after seeing the pilot?

NBC planned to pick up the story a generation on at a small college, with most of the old cast returning. The pilot reportedly had mixed results, and the order was scrapped within months.

Which Major Dad star guest-stars on Coach as Jim Collins, a 46-year-old who tries out for Hayden Fox's team?

Gerald McRaney played the middle-aged walk-on, a military veteran back at college whose tryout sets Hayden brooding about his own age.

The university president makes Hayden Fox honor his contract on Coach by teaching a course in which subject?

Ancient history proves no easy ride: Hayden plans a course his players can coast through, then learns the syllabus demands Egypt, Greece and Rome.

In the Coach finale's epilogue, Howard and Shirley Burleigh buy a dinner theatre by selling a rare collection of what?

Barbie dolls funded a successful dinner theatre in Florida. The Burleighs' tastes were no secret: they had once handed over a limited-edition Princess Tiffany doll as a gift, to Hayden's unease.

Dauber's long romance with Judy Watkins ends on Coach when she admits an affair after a coaching job in which country?

Romania was where Judy had gone to coach, and she came home to call off the engagement. The couple had been together since the second season, despite her feud with Hayden.

Bill Fagerbakke based Dauber on a graduate assistant nicknamed Tuna at which university, where he had played football?

Idaho had Fagerbakke on its defensive line until a knee injury in spring drills ended his playing days and turned his focus to theater.

Which future Empire star plays Johnny Williams, a blue-chip quarterback Hayden Fox hopes to recruit on Coach?

Terrence Howard, billed as Terrence Dashon Howard, played the son of Hayden's old college friend. The snag is that Johnny has lost interest in playing football at all.

Which roadside attraction does Luther Van Dam buy on Coach, only to discover that its animals are dying?

Turtle World was one of Luther's ventures after the staff moved to Florida. He also tried life in a retirement community, where three women competed to cook for him.