The most confidently wrong answer I’ve ever heard at a trivia night was someone insisting, with their whole chest, that the Dallas Cowboys have won six Super Bowls. Their table backed them up. The entire table was wrong, and the look on their faces when the answer came back as five was the kind of silence you can’t manufacture. That’s football trivia. Everyone thinks they know it. The sport lives in our cultural bloodstream so deeply that people confuse what they’ve absorbed through osmosis with what they actually know.
I’ve been running these football trivia questions and answers at live events for years, and the pattern never changes. The casual fans get tripped up by history. The hardcore fans get tripped up by the stuff that’s so basic they overthink it. And everybody, without exception, gets tripped up by kickers. Nobody ever knows the kickers.
Here are 75 questions. Some will feel like layups. Some will make you question your entire football identity. The order matters. Stay with it.
1. How many teams are in the NFL?
I open with this at events because it establishes who’s actually paying attention versus who’s just here for the wings. You’d be surprised how many people hesitate.
2. What’s the only NFL team that has its logo on just one side of the helmet?
This one plays beautifully in a room because half the people picture the helmet immediately and the other half start mentally cycling through every team they can think of.
3. How many points is a touchdown worth?
Yes, I’m asking this. And yes, at a bar trivia night in 2019, a team of four adults wrote down seven. The extra point is not automatic, people.
4. Which team has won the most Super Bowls?
This one used to start fights between Steelers and Patriots fans. Now it starts three-way arguments.
5. What color is the penalty flag that referees throw?
I include this because it’s the perfect palate cleanser between harder questions. Nobody gets it wrong, but it makes everyone feel good, and a room that feels good plays better.
6. The Super Bowl is played on what day of the week?
The real question here is whether anyone tries to be clever and says Monday, since the game sometimes runs past midnight on the East Coast.
7. What NFL team plays its home games at Lambeau Field?
Named after Curly Lambeau, the team’s co-founder. I love watching people who’ve heard “Lambeau” a thousand times suddenly realize they never connected it to a person.
8. How long is an NFL football field, in yards, from end zone to end zone?
Careful. The answer depends on whether you’re including the end zones or not, and I’ve seen this question cause genuine anguish.
9. Which city’s team is nicknamed “America’s Team”?
Half the room groans when this answer comes up. The nickname was coined by NFL Films, not by the Cowboys themselves, which somehow makes it more annoying to everyone who isn’t a Cowboys fan.
10. What position does the player who snaps the ball play?
11. Who holds the NFL record for the most career passing touchdowns?
This one has shifted recently enough that older fans sometimes lock in the wrong guy. Recency matters in record books.
12. What team did the NFL’s all-time leading rusher, Emmitt Smith, spend the majority of his career with?
Smith is still the all-time leader, which shocks younger fans who assume someone has passed him by now. Nobody has come particularly close.
13. Before it was called the Super Bowl, what was the NFL’s championship game called?
This is one where the confident-sounding wrong answers are better than the right one. I’ve heard “The Big Game,” “The National Championship,” and once, memorably, “The Mega Bowl.”
14. What jersey number did Joe Montana wear?
Jersey number questions are sneaky. People who watched Montana play get this instantly. Everyone else takes a guess and commits to it with way too much confidence.
15. Which team won the first ever Super Bowl?
16. What is the only NFL franchise to have a perfect undefeated season, including the Super Bowl?
Every year when the last unbeaten team loses, the 1972 Dolphins reportedly pop champagne. Whether that’s actually true or just a great story, I’ve never been able to fully verify. But it’s the kind of detail that makes this answer stick.
17. In what city was the NFL founded?
Nobody gets this. I’ve asked it maybe fifty times and I can count the correct answers on one hand.
18. What’s the most points ever scored by a single team in a Super Bowl?
People always anchor to the most recent blowout they remember. The real answer is older than most of them expect.
19. Who was the first African American head coach to win a Super Bowl?
This question always brings the room to a certain kind of quiet. The answer carries weight beyond football.
20. What does NFL stand for?
I throw this in after a hard stretch because it lets the room breathe. But I once had someone write “National Football Association” and they defended it for a solid minute.
21. Which NFL team was originally called the “Decatur Staleys”?
22. Who is the youngest starting quarterback to win a Super Bowl?
People always say Patrick Mahomes. He was 24. The actual answer is younger.
23. The “Immaculate Reception” is one of the most famous plays in NFL history. Which player caught the ball?
If you know this play, you can see it. The ball ricocheting, Franco Harris scooping it inches from the ground. If you don’t know it, this is your invitation to look it up after.
24. What team moved from Baltimore to Indianapolis in the middle of the night in 1984?
The Mayflower moving trucks. One of the most dramatic franchise relocations in sports history. Baltimore fans still haven’t fully forgiven it.
25. Which coach has the most Super Bowl wins?
26. What was the “Ice Bowl”?
The temperature at kickoff was minus 13 degrees Fahrenheit. The wind chill was minus 48. I like asking this one because it forces people to imagine playing football in conditions that would make most of us refuse to leave the car.
27. Before the merger, what did “AFL” stand for?
28. Who was the first overall pick in the very first NFL Draft in 1936?
Nobody is getting this one. I include it because the story behind it is better than the answer.
29. The Vince Lombardi Trophy is awarded to the Super Bowl winner. What is it made of?
30. Which team lost four consecutive Super Bowls?
This answer always gets a sympathetic groan. Four years in a row, getting to the biggest game in football and losing every single time. That’s a particular kind of heartbreak.
31. How many players from each team are on the field during a play?
32. What is the record for the most touchdowns scored in a single NFL game by one player?
This record is so old it feels like folklore. And it’s been tied but never broken, which tells you something about how absurd it was.
33. How many minutes are in a regulation NFL game?
The clock says one thing. Your couch says three and a half hours. I accept both answers emotionally, but only one on the scorecard.
34. What’s the longest field goal in NFL history?
This record changed recently, and it changed in a way that made a lot of people say “Wait, who?”
35. How many teams make the NFL playoffs each season under the current format?
36. What is a “safety” worth in terms of points?
Safeties are rare enough that casual fans sometimes blank on the point value entirely. I’ve gotten answers of 1, 3, and once, somehow, 5.
37. Who holds the record for most receiving yards in a single NFL season?
38. How many rounds are in the current NFL Draft?
39. What quarterback holds the record for the most interceptions thrown in a career?
This is one of my favorite questions because the answer is a Hall of Famer. Context matters in football stats. You throw a lot of interceptions when you play for two decades and throw the ball constantly.
40. What’s the largest margin of victory in Super Bowl history?
41. Who has more career rushing yards: Walter Payton or Barry Sanders?
This question is really asking: do you know that Barry Sanders retired early? Because that changes the entire math of the debate.
42. The “Tuck Rule Game” involved which two teams?
If you’re a Raiders fan, you just felt your blood pressure rise. If you’re a Patriots fan, you’re already smiling.
43. Which NFL team has appeared in the most Super Bowls without ever winning one?
This is a sadness question. The answer is a franchise defined partly by this fact.
44. Who caught “The Catch” from Joe Montana in the 1981 NFC Championship Game?
45. What team drafted Johnny Manziel in 2014?
This one gets a specific kind of laugh. The kind where everyone remembers the hype and then remembers what came after.
46. Who threw “The Helmet Catch” pass in Super Bowl XLII, and who caught it?
47. What’s the only team to score three points or fewer in a Super Bowl and still win?
This is a trick question, sort of. The answer is that it’s never happened. But watch how many people try to convince themselves it has.
48. True or false: an NFL game can end in a tie.
Regular season, yes. Playoffs, no. The number of people who don’t know this is staggering.
49. Which running back is known as “Sweetness”?
50. What year did the NFL officially adopt instant replay for the first time?
The key word is “first time.” The NFL tried replay, scrapped it, and then brought it back. Most people only remember the comeback.
51. The Heisman Trophy is awarded to the most outstanding player in what level of football?
52. Who is the only player to win the Heisman Trophy twice?
53. What does the 40-yard dash at the NFL Combine measure?
Everyone knows it measures speed. The real question is: why 40 yards? The commonly cited reason is that it’s roughly the distance of a punt, so it measures how fast a player can cover kickoff distance. Whether that’s apocryphal or not, it’s the answer that lives in football culture.
54. Tom Brady was drafted in what round?
This is maybe the most famous draft story in NFL history. Every time I ask it, someone in the room says the answer with a tone of disbelief, as if they still can’t process it.
55. What college did Peyton Manning attend?
56. Which team selected quarterback Ryan Leaf with the second overall pick in the 1998 NFL Draft?
Ryan Leaf is the cautionary tale that every draft analyst keeps in their back pocket. Picked right after Peyton Manning. The divergence in their careers is almost too dramatic to be real.
57. What school has produced the most first overall picks in the NFL Draft?
58. Which Super Bowl featured Janet Jackson’s infamous halftime show wardrobe malfunction?
This question gets asked at trivia nights more than almost any other Super Bowl question. Not because of football, but because this moment became bigger than the game itself.
59. What was the final score of Super Bowl XLVIII, the most lopsided Super Bowl of the 21st century?
60. What city hosted the first Super Bowl?
61. Who is the only player to be named Super Bowl MVP and not be on the winning team?
This is a fact that sounds made up. Someone played well enough to be the game’s most valuable player and still lost. That’s a particular brand of excellence.
62. Which quarterback led the largest comeback in Super Bowl history?
If you watched this game, you remember exactly where you were. If you didn’t, you’ve heard about it enough times that it feels like you did.
63. What Roman numeral represents Super Bowl 50?
Trick question. They didn’t use a Roman numeral. The NFL broke their own tradition because “L” by itself looked strange in their branding. I love this question because it reveals who was paying attention to the marketing and who wasn’t.
64. What team won Super Bowl 50?
65. What NFL team is the only one owned by its fans as a publicly held nonprofit?
66. What was the original color of the football used in the NFL?
Modern footballs look brown, and people assume it’s always been that way. It hasn’t.
67. Which NFL franchise has gone the longest without winning a championship of any kind (NFL or Super Bowl)?
68. What is the “Terrible Towel,” and which team’s fans wave it?
69. Who is the NFL’s all-time leading scorer?
Here’s where the kicker thing comes in. I warned you. Nobody ever knows the kickers.
70. What NFL rule is named after Deion Sanders?
There isn’t one officially named after him, but this question is designed to make people think hard and realize they’re confusing him with someone else. The real question they’re thinking of involves Mel Blount.
71. How many laces are on an official NFL football?
I’ve never seen anyone get this right on the first try. People either wildly overestimate or say “one” because they’re picturing the single lace strip on top.
72. What was the name of the USFL team that Donald Trump owned in the 1980s?
73. Which NFL stadium is known as “The Linc”?
74. What quarterback was known as “The Sheriff”?
The nickname came from his habit of calling audibles at the line of scrimmage, essentially running the offense like a field general. Or a sheriff, directing traffic.
75. In the entire history of the Super Bowl, only one game has ever gone to overtime. Which one was it, who won, and what was the final score?
I save this one for last at every football trivia night because it’s a three-part question that rewards real knowledge, and because the game itself was one of the most dramatic sporting events most of us will ever see. The room always goes quiet when I read it. Half the people know the game but can’t remember the exact score. The other half remember the score but second-guess themselves on the overtime detail. And somewhere in every room, there’s one person who watched every second of that game and has been waiting all night for a question worthy of that memory.
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