Who is Coach in New Girl?

Show

New Girl

Played by

Damon Wayans Jr.

First episode

“Pilot”Season 1, Episode 1, aired September 20, 2011

Role

Main cast

Network

FOX

Occupation

Personal trainer, then middle school coach

Show run

2011 to 2018

Also known as

Ernie Tagliaboo, Ernie

Coach is the cocky, driven former athlete who shares the loft with Nick and Schmidt in New Girl's very first episode, then moves out before the second. Played by Damon Wayans Jr., he comes back in season three and becomes a full member of the gang, sensitive streak and all.

On New Girl, Coach's story runs through Nick Miller (Former Roommate), Schmidt (Roommate), Winston Bishop (Roommate), Jess Day (Friend and Coworker), and Cece Parekh (Ex-girlfriend).

Who is Coach?

Coach, whose real name is Ernie Tagliaboo, is one of the three roommates Jess meets when she answers an online ad for a room in the pilot. He is a former athlete and personal trainer with a habit of yelling, and he is the roommate most baffled by the new girl. By the next episode he has moved out to live with his girlfriend, and Nick's old friend Winston moves back in to take his place.

Two seasons later, fresh off a breakup with that girlfriend, Coach drifts back into the group's life and soon back into the loft, taking over Schmidt's old room. The return lets the show treat him as a real member of the gang rather than a pilot curiosity, and his sensitive side gets far more room to show.

Personality and comedy

Coach is all intensity on the outside: competitive, loud, and sure that most problems can be solved with a workout or a pep talk. The joke is how quickly that armor cracks. He is awkward around women he actually likes, easily wounded, and far more emotional than he wants anyone to know.

His friendship with Jess is a slow build. At first he has little interest in her, so she tries to bond with him by pretending to be a die-hard Detroit Pistons fan, which goes about as well as it sounds. He also gets swept into the loft's schemes, including a Thanksgiving held in the wilderness largely to prove to him that Nick is still a man's man while dating Jess.

Key storylines

Coach drops in for a guys' night in the season three episode "Coach," moves into the loft an episode later, and briefly dates Cece, much to Schmidt's dismay. Jess later gets him a coaching job at her school, only to have to let him go for budget reasons after she is promoted to vice principal, and by season four he is teaching gym and health there.

On a bar crawl in season four, Coach meets a cellist named May (Meaghan Rath), and they realize they kept just missing each other growing up. They start dating soon after. When May lands an opportunity at the Metropolitan Opera, he decides to follow her to New York, and the season four finale, "Clean Break," sends him off. He drops back in as a guest in each of the last three seasons, and the gang eventually learns he and May have moved to North Carolina.

Behind the scenes

Coach was nearly written out before the show even aired. Damon Wayans Jr. took the role expecting his ABC sitcom Happy Endings to be canceled, but it was renewed, so Lamorne Morris, who had also read for Coach, joined as Winston from episode two. Reshooting Wayans out of the pilot would have meant redoing most of it, so the producers kept Coach in the first episode and wrote him out.

After Happy Endings ended, Wayans returned for a season three arc and was made a series regular for season four, which is why Coach counts as main cast. He made guest appearances in each of the last three seasons.

Coach: frequently asked questions

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