As a part of Valentine’s Week, here is another installment. This time, we delve in the 1978 B-movie delight, Coach. 

THE SKINNY: Back in 2011, Bill Simmons unearthed a trailer for the film Coach, starring Cathy Lee Crosby. It appeared to be awkward and your typical 70s B-film.

Unfortunately, it was out of print on DVD, so I gave up of finding it rather easily. After all, no one would possibly have this film available online.

Well, upon doing some digging, the film popped up on Daily Motion in its entirety.

Now, I’ve seen this movie three times. It gets better (and worse) each time.

The plot revolves around “Olympic runner” Randy Rawlings, who wins a gold medal, and then eventually takes over a terrible high school basketball team.

As a disclaimer, Crosby was approaching 34 when this film was released.

00:00 – 1:45: Randy Rawlings is running in something that vaguely resembles the Olympics. She earns a gold medal. The first minute or so is heavy-breathing and cheering…two central themes in the film.

3:00 – 4:00: We cut from the high of winning a gold medal to being a dance instructor for women pushing 50. Fall from grace personified.

4:15 – 7:35: Next, we meet a lowly high school basketball team. Michael Biehn of Terminator fame poses as one of the star players (Jack). The team is god awful. Their head coach is a wormy fella that sounds like Woody Allen. He is such a dreadful leader, that he gets fired DURING the game by an older lad. Just picture Jerry Jones with a beard and derby.

8:00 – 10:30: Moving forward to a team party complete with underage drinking and the players’ girlfriends doing a cheer and going topless in front of the team. The theory was their men were sad and it was the only way to cheer them up. Soon after, they cover up in embarrassment.

11:04 – 12:00: A Randy sighting on the beach…wearing what any other woman would wear during a jog…daisy dukes and a white top.

15:00 – 17:00: Here comes the application process meeting. Great, classic bad movie scene. Two old curmudgeons think Randy, who applied for the job, is a man. Of course, under the auspice that she was a he, Randy was offered the job. She walks in and The Odd Couple is aghast that Randy is actually a blonde bombshell. Cue over the top sexism from the old men and Randy referencing an EEO plan.

19:20 – 21:00: She threatens to sue, which gives her leverage and the job. Her dress on the first day includes shorts and a low-cut V-neck shirt. I’m guessing Pat Summitt never dressed like this. Anyhow, she walks onto the floor and pops two 20-foot jumpers to woo the boys.

22:00 – 26:00: High school boys with an attractive female coach? Get ready for a deluge of inappropriate dialogue.

Brad asks Coach if she is ok with “late” practices. Oh geez. She tells them she is going to teach them how to play basketball…how?! She never played. These horn dogs aren’t worried about that since they are the Charlotte Bobcats of high school basketball.

“EVERYBODY TO THE SHOWERS…NOW!!!”

The team heads to the showers…RANDY WALKS INTO THE SHOWER TO TURN ON THE COLD WATER!! On the inappropriate scale of 1 to 10, that registers at a 21.

27:00 – 27:30: Upon leaving practice Randy, is approached by one of the creepy dudes from the hiring meeting (Tom). He asks her out for coffee. Nice guy but a bit dorky.

LESSON LEARNED: Creepster McGee stalked her out to ask for coffee. Good job in asking for the less-expensive coffee run but terrible idea to stalk. How Ted Bundy of him.

31:50 – 32:30: Terminator Boy (Jack) walks into Randy’s office without knocking and of course, she’s nearly in the buff and quickly threw her shirt on. He wants to assure her that they can win games…riiiight.

34:00 – 35:00: Former UCLA star Sidney Wicks makes a cameo. This is a like bad basketball instructional video.

41:15 – 46:00: The train starts running off the track here. Randy fraternizes with John Connor in the back seat of a bus on the way to a game…and then plays a lewd version of sing-a-long with the team.  Once the team arrives, they are greeted by the opposing head coach.

“They got rid of the f—-t and they hired themselves a star.” They didn’t pull many punches back in the 70s. He then goes into period jokes. Tough audience. This leads to an all-out brawl between the two teams outside of the school. This movie is too rich for words.

47:30 – 48:50: Randy meets up with Jerry Jones II after the brawl. She goes into 2008 Ric Flair mode and says he can fire her after the next game she loses.

49:00 – 51:00: Creepy guy, known as Tom, asked her out on another date…this time dinner. He practically begs for it and she declines. Moments later, she flirts with Terminator Boy and practically insinuates that he should show up to the beach.

51:45 – 53:20: Well, lookee here!!! Jack finds his way to the beach, where Coach Rawlings just happens to be. They begin frolicking around on the beach and in the water. In case you’re keeping score at home, rolling around in water with one of your players is a 75 on the previously mentioned inappropriate scale.

54:00 – 57:00: This leads to them changing their clothes back at her place. Sweet Jesus. You know where this is headed. At least Jack made a “best in the world” reference. Love that phrase!

57:37 – 58:30: This fool kisses the coach and then celebrates outside of her house. Of course, before doing this, he lays the groundwork for another get together.

58:30 – 59:50: A campy video begins featuring their next meeting. Activities include roller skating, long walks, making out, and dumping water on each other…you know, the normal stuff.

1:00:00 – 1:03:00: A suicide drill scene is followed by them horsing around at her house and then heading up stairs…to do their taxes. While in bed, they share one of my favorites exchanges during the movie:

TB: Randy……….I love you.
Randy: Jaaaack, haha. I…just…can’t….anymore, hahaha.
TB: Hey, you alright?
Randy: I’m fine Jack….I can’t, haha.

WHAT?!? Well, Jack…she doesn’t love you.

1:04:43 – 1:05:30: We’re on fire now…

Jack: “How many guys have you made love to?”

She admits to seven. Coach-student/player relationship!! Who wrote this script???! Who thought this was a good idea?

The best part is no other teammate or school official has the slightest idea of this romance. Good god.

1:10:30 – 1:14:00: Practice is over. Randy goes into the locker room to make sure “everything is locked up” as she says to a player in passing. Well, she went in there for another reason…to play connect the dots with Jack…while he showers. I mean, why did someone agree to make this movie?!? It’s so wrong!!!!! A janitor walks into the shower area only for Randy (down to a towel at this point) to cut him off at the pass before he finds out that she’s doing unsavory things in the shower with a student.

1:14:00 – 1:15:00: This is easily one of the 20 worst soundtracks in film history. So bad that I doubt it’s available.

1:17:00 – 1:18:00: Remember the pre-game fight between the Bulls and Stallions earlier? Well, the rematch for the championship is days away. Surely, something is bound to go wrong…and it does. Creepy Tom tells Randy that he has a scout buddy that wants to watch the team, for no particular reason.

She goes along with it and then receives a ride from Tom back to her place. Before she gets out of the car, Tom makes out with her and Jack sees it. Color him very angry.

1:19:00 – 1:22:00: Upset that his lady/coach stepped out on him, Jack shows up right before the opening tip of the title game…and then checks himself in. BURN!

1:22:00 – 1:27:00: Fuming over Jack and the team’s poor first half play, Randy lights into the team with an actually halfway decent halftime speech.

1:27:30 – 1:29:00: Coach and Jack talk about the latter’s unhappiness. During the discussion, Randy introduces Jack to the scout brought in by Tom, the dude who Coach made out with.

After realizing that was why she hooked up with Tom, Jack starts to understand.

Randy’s reaction to Jack’s anger:

“You saw that and then thought that I…awww, sh*t…Nevermind! Go out there and play basketball.”

That’s how you get out of trouble in the 70s, boys and girls. Brush the accusations aside and tell them to go out and play basketball!

The game finally swings when Randy screams a code word (jabber wocky) to the center (Ned) as a way to hypnotize him, which had been done throughout the movie.

By hypnotizing Ned, he believes he is former NBA center Sidney Wicks. Incredible.

1:30:00 – 1:36:00: These fools are actually chanting “jabber wocky”…including the coach of the evil and sexist Bulls for some odd reason. Of course, Ned’s run leads to a deluge of campy music and a righteous comeback against the Bulls.

The game ends with the Stallions winning the title and everyone going crazy. Coach Randy gets carried off and the credits start to roll…and she gets away, scot free.

The best part is the music in the closing credits…

“My basketball coach is a lovely lady…smile if you call her a dame.”

TURN IT OFF!!!

SUMMARY: I’d love to see the reaction to this movie if someone re-made it 2013. It is so morally corrupt that it’s comical.

Coach Randy was slick though. She wanted what she wanted when she wanted it. During the film, she bagged Jack, and used that poor fellow Tom, whom she made out with but after being caught red-handed somehow came out clean

Perhaps all that mattered in the end was the trailer’s tagline.

“Winning is the greatest turn-on.”