It's a ridiculous summer for sports. A World Cup, Wimbledon, The Open, the Tour de France, and an All-Star Game all crammed into a few weeks, which means every group chat in America is currently arguing about something. This list is for settling those arguments.
Forty questions with answers, sorted from layups everybody makes to deep cuts that decide the whole thing. All of it is checkable fact, so the loudest person at the table doesn't automatically win.
Layups (everybody scores)
1. How many players from one basketball team are on the court at a time?
Answer: Five.
2. What trophy does the Super Bowl winner take home?
Answer: The Vince Lombardi Trophy.
3. Which sport crowns its champion at the World Series?
Answer: Baseball.
4. In golf, how many holes make up a full round?
Answer: Eighteen.
5. What is it called when a soccer player scores three goals in one game?
Answer: A hat-trick.
6. The NHL champion hoists which famous trophy?
Answer: The Stanley Cup.
7. How often are the Summer Olympics held?
Answer: Every four years.
8. What jersey number did Michael Jordan make famous?
Answer: 23.
9. In tennis, what does a score of love mean?
Answer: Zero.
10. Which sport did Babe Ruth play?
Answer: Baseball.
11. What color jersey does the leader of the Tour de France wear?
Answer: Yellow.
12. Which sport is played at Wimbledon?
Answer: Tennis, on grass courts.
Mid-range (this is where teams separate)
13. How long is a marathon?
Answer: 26.2 miles, or 42.195 kilometers.
14. Which country hosted the first modern Olympics in 1896?
Answer: Greece. The games were held in Athens.
15. Winning which golf tournament earns you a green jacket?
Answer: The Masters.
16. How many Grand Slam tournaments are there in tennis each year?
Answer: Four: the Australian Open, the French Open, Wimbledon, and the US Open.
17. Which men's national team has won the most World Cups?
Answer: Brazil, with five.
18. What is a perfect score in bowling?
Answer: 300.
19. How many innings are in a standard baseball game?
Answer: Nine.
20. Which NBA franchise has won the most championships?
Answer: The Boston Celtics, with 18.
21. What shape is a boxing ring, really?
Answer: A square. The name never got the memo.
22. Which country is soccer legend Pele from?
Answer: Brazil.
23. What sport uses a shuttlecock instead of a ball?
Answer: Badminton.
24. How many players are on a cricket team?
Answer: Eleven.
25. What is the national sport of Japan?
Answer: Sumo wrestling.
26. Which team won the very first Super Bowl?
Answer: The Green Bay Packers, in 1967.
Deep cuts (settle in, this gets competitive)
27. What is Usain Bolt's world record time in the 100 meters?
Answer: 9.58 seconds, set in 2009. Still standing.
28. Who has won the most Olympic gold medals ever?
Answer: Michael Phelps, with 23 golds.
29. How many Grand Slam singles titles did Serena Williams win?
Answer: 23, the most of any player in the Open Era.
30. Name the three races that make up horse racing's Triple Crown.
Answer: The Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes, and the Belmont Stakes.
31. The famous Maracana stadium is in which country?
Answer: Brazil, in Rio de Janeiro.
32. Which women's national team has won the most FIFA Women's World Cups?
Answer: The United States, with four.
33. What was Muhammad Ali's birth name?
Answer: Cassius Clay.
34. Which country is traditionally credited with inventing golf?
Answer: Scotland.
35. How many points is a free throw worth in basketball?
Answer: One.
36. What is NASCAR's most famous race, held every February?
Answer: The Daytona 500.
37. Which hockey legend is known simply as The Great One?
Answer: Wayne Gretzky.
38. What material is a hockey puck made of?
Answer: Vulcanized rubber.
39. How many events are in a decathlon?
Answer: Ten. It's in the name, but the name is in Greek.
40. How long is an American football field between the goal lines?
Answer: 100 yards. 120 if you count both end zones.
Keeping score
Rough scoring: 34 or better means you're the friend people text instead of Googling. 22 to 33 is solid sports-bar form. Under 15, you clicked this by accident, and we respect that you stayed.
For a soccer-only gauntlet, our World Cup trivia questions go deeper on the tournament everyone is watching. And if you're taking a squad to a real trivia night, at least show up with one of these 110 funny team names.
Sports questions that update with the season
Trend Trivia writes new questions from real headlines every week, so the sports category actually knows what happened last night. Free on iOS and Android.
