Seattle Seahawks
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This Seahawks trivia quiz has 48 free questions with answers and covers fifty years of Seattle football: the 1976 expansion team and its name contest, Jim Zorn to Steve Largent, the Kingdome and the Chuck Knox playoff runs, Kenny Easley and Cortez Kennedy, the near-move to Anaheim and Paul Allen's rescue, Holmgren, Hasselbeck and Super Bowl XL, then Pete Carroll, the Legion of Boom, Beast Quake, the 43-8 rout of Denver, the interception at the one, and Mike Macdonald's Super Bowl LX champions. Roughly a third of the questions are easy enough for casual fans, a third are medium, and the rest are for people who know their Sea Gals from their 12s. Every question is multiple choice with a short explanation after you answer. Every answer has been checked against a primary source, and each question links to the page that confirms it.
30 of 48 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which team joined the NFL with the Seahawks in 1976?
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Tampa Bay Buccaneers: both newcomers were stocked from a thin pool of players the established teams left unprotected, so Seattle won only twice that year and Tampa Bay lost all 14 of its games.
Q 02Which Seattle business family were the Seahawks' original majority owners?
The Nordstrom family
The Nordstrom family: the shoe-store dynasty held 51 percent, but Lloyd Nordstrom, who led the bid, died months before the team's first game in 1976.
Q 03Where did the Seahawks play their home games from 1976 to 1999?
The Kingdome
The Kingdome: the concrete dome was imploded in March 2000, yet King County did not finish paying off its debts until 2015.
Q 04Where did the Seahawks play home games in 2000 and 2001 while their new home was being built?
Husky Stadium
Husky Stadium: the University of Washington's ground had rescued them before, hosting early-season games in 1994 after ceiling tiles fell at their regular home.
Q 05The Seahawks' home since 2002 opened under which name?
Seahawks Stadium
Seahawks Stadium: Qwest bought the naming rights in 2004, and the two later names needed no new sponsor, as Qwest was taken over by CenturyLink, which then rebranded as Lumen.
Q 06Who was the Seahawks' first head coach, hired in January 1976?
Jack Patera
Jack Patera: the NFL's Coach of the Year in 1978, he was fired four years later in the middle of a players' strike, with no games being played.
Q 07In which division did the Seahawks play from 1977 until the NFL's 2002 realignment?
AFC West
AFC West: after one season in the NFC, Seattle swapped places with its fellow 1976 newcomer so that both would face every other team within two years, and it moved back in 2002.
Q 08The Seahawks landed Steve Largent in 1976 by trading an eighth-round pick to which team?
Houston Oilers
Houston Oilers: they thought the rookie too small and slow and were set to cut him after four preseason games, until one of his college coaches, by then in Seattle, urged a trade.
Q 09Which receiver broke Steve Largent's NFL record of 100 career touchdown catches in 1992?
Jerry Rice
Jerry Rice: he ended his playing days in Seattle in 2004, where the Seahawks unretired Largent's No. 80 so that he could wear it.
Q 10Seahawks great Steve Largent was elected to the US House of Representatives from which state, his birthplace?
Oklahoma
Oklahoma: after four terms he gave up the seat to run for governor in 2002 and lost by fewer than 7,000 votes.
Q 11Which left-handed quarterback started the Seahawks' first game in 1976 after going undrafted?
Jim Zorn
Jim Zorn: the Dallas Cowboys had cut him the year before, yet he started all 14 games of Seattle's first season and was named his conference's Offensive Rookie of the Year.
Q 12After the 1983 season the Seahawks lost their first conference title game to which eventual Super Bowl champion?
Los Angeles Raiders
Los Angeles Raiders: Seattle had beaten them twice during the season, but the Raiders won 30–14 when it mattered and went on to take the Super Bowl.
Q 13Which Seahawks defensive back was the NFL's Defensive Player of the Year in 1984?
Kenny Easley
Q 21Which defending champions did the 7-9 Seahawks of 2010 beat in the playoffs?
New Orleans Saints
New Orleans Saints: the 41-36 upset was sealed when Marshawn Lynch broke tackle after tackle on a 67-yard touchdown run.
Q 22Marshawn Lynch was famous for celebrating touchdowns with which candy?
Skittles
Skittles: his mother fed them to him at high school games, and after cameras caught him eating them on the sideline in 2011 the maker offered him a two-year supply.
Q 23Which team traded Marshawn Lynch to the Seahawks during the 2010 season?
Buffalo Bills
Buffalo Bills: they let the 12th pick of the 2007 draft go for two modest draft choices, and in Seattle he rejoined his college roommate, running back Justin Forsett.
Kenny Easley: a kidney disease found at a trade physical ended his career after seven seasons, and he waited until 2017 to reach the Hall of Fame.
Q 14Which Seahawks tackle was NFL Defensive Player of the Year on a two-win team in 1992?
Cortez Kennedy
Cortez Kennedy: he swapped his No. 96 for 99 that season in tribute to his best friend Jerome Brown, the Eagles tackle killed in a car crash that summer.
Q 15In 1996 owner Ken Behring tried to move the Seahawks' operations to which California city?
Anaheim
Anaheim: he set up at the practice base the Rams had just left there, until the NFL commissioner ordered the team home and, facing daily fines, he complied.
Q 16Which billionaire bought the Seahawks in 1997 after voters approved public money for a new stadium?
Paul Allen
Paul Allen: the Microsoft co-founder paid about $200 million and made the deal depend on a statewide stadium vote, even paying for the election himself.
Q 17Against which team did Matt Hasselbeck announce 'We want the ball and we're going to score' at an overtime coin toss?
Green Bay Packers
Green Bay Packers: later in overtime Hasselbeck, once Brett Favre's backup there, threw an interception that Al Harris ran back 52 yards to win the playoff game.
Q 18Which Seahawks running back was named NFL MVP in 2005?
Shaun Alexander
Shaun Alexander: his 28 touchdowns that season set an NFL record, but after he made the Madden cover a broken foot wrecked his next year.
Q 19Super Bowl XL, the Seahawks' first Super Bowl, was lost 21-10 to which team?
Pittsburgh Steelers
Pittsburgh Steelers: the officiating drew such anger that referee Bill Leavy said in 2010 he had 'kicked two calls' in the fourth quarter and affected the game.
Q 20Which coach ended the Seahawks' two-decade wait for a playoff win on the way to Super Bowl XL?
Mike Holmgren
Mike Holmgren: Seattle lured him in 1999 by making him general manager as well as coach, and the playoff win finally came in January 2006, weeks before the Super Bowl.
Q 24Which line did Marshawn Lynch repeat at Super Bowl XLIX Media Day?
I'm just here so I won't get fined
'I'm just here so I won't get fined': the NFL had already docked him $100,000 that season for refusing to talk to reporters, so he turned up, repeated the line and left.
Q 25Russell Wilson was drafted by the Seahawks in which round of the 2012 draft?
Third
Third: at under 5-foot-11 he was thought too short, and Seattle had just signed free agent Matt Flynn to be its starter, yet the rookie won the job before his first game.
Q 26Before the NFL, Russell Wilson played minor league baseball for which MLB organisation?
Colorado Rockies
Colorado Rockies: he played second base in their farm system for two summers, and weeks before he won the Super Bowl the Texas Rangers claimed his baseball rights anyway.
Q 27Russell Wilson transferred to which university for his record-setting final college season in 2011?
Wisconsin
Wisconsin: NC State released him after its coach objected to the time he gave to baseball, and in his one season with the Badgers he won the Big Ten and reached the Rose Bowl.
Q 28Russell Wilson was traded away from Seattle in 2022 to which team?
Denver Broncos
Denver Broncos: Seattle received two first-round picks, two second-rounders and three players, and Denver released Wilson two years later.
Q 29Which Legion of Boom cornerback was a fifth-round pick who began at Stanford as a wide receiver?
Richard Sherman
Richard Sherman: he led the NFL in interceptions in 2013, and his end-zone deflection in the NFC title game sent Seattle to the Super Bowl it won.
Q 30The Seahawks' 43-8 win in Super Bowl XLVIII came against which opposing quarterback?
Peyton Manning
Peyton Manning: his offense had scored a then-record 606 points that season, yet Seattle held it to a single touchdown and won by 35.