Gary Gaines, Kyle Chandler's Friday Night Lights inspiration, dies at 73

Gary Gaines, the real-life high school football coach who inspired Kyle Chandler's character in NBC's beloved Friday Night Lights TV series, has died at age 73.

Gaines died Monday in Lubbock, Tex., after a battle with Alzheimer's disease, AP News reports.

A tweet from the team Gaines previously coached also confirmed the news: "RIP Coach Gary Gaines. We lost a great coach and a better man," the Odessa Permian Panthers' Twitter account shared after his death.

Though Gaines had a 30-year career as a football coach, his initial four-year tenure with the Panthers — including the team's memorable 1988 season — inspired Buzz Bissinger's 1990 book Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream. His record from 1986-89 included 47 wins and only six losses, reports AP News.

Director Peter Berg later adapted the nonfiction account into a movie in 2004, with Billy Bob Thornton portraying Gaines. Berg then worked with NBC to bring the story to television in 2006, helping create a series that lasted five seasons, with Chandler playing a fictionalized football coach, Eric Taylor, inspired by Gaines.

Paul Drinkwater/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images; Kevin Buehler/AP/Shutterstock; Everett Collection 'Friday Night Lights' coach Gary Gaines — who was played by Kyle Chandler and Billy Bob Thornton on TV and in the film — has died at 73.

Born in 1949, Gaines played football for the Golden Cranes high school team in Crane, Tex., and later for the Angelo State Rams.

"I was there when he was inducted into the Texas High School Coaches Hall of Fame," former Odessa Panthers coach Ron King told local news after Gaines' death. "I just can't find the words to pay respects. It's a big loss for the coaching profession. There are a lot of coaches he took under his wing and mentored. He had a lot of young coaches. He was a difference maker — like when you are coaching kids, you are trying to make a difference. I think Coach Gaines did that."

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