Touchdowns of the Heart

Is your husband coming home late at night with the scent of White Diamonds on his collar? Are you in love with your sister's husband? Should you marry your longtime boyfriend even if he won't get a job? For the answers to these and other dilemmas of the heart, turn your radio dial to the gruff voice of the Love Coach -- better known as Kim Helton, head football coach for the University of Houston Cougars.

Helton became known as the Love Coach two years ago when he was being interviewed on KRBE/104 FM by DJ Sam Malone. After Malone's next guest, a relationship counselor, proved to be a no-show, Helton stayed on the air and casually offered his opinion on a romance quandary posed earlier that morning.

Malone put Helton on the hot seat, announcing to listeners that the "Love Coach" was available to answer questions. A woman called for advice and Helton, in characteristic no-nonsense fashion, answered her as bluntly as he would a player on the scrimmage line. He had found his second calling -- and a regular gig.

Helton bases his love advice on nothing more than life experiences and a happy 28-year marriage to his wife, Pam, the mother of his two sons. "I'm just a football coach expressing my opinions," he says. "I don't have a background in psychology."

But apparently there's a market for football-coach advice about matters of the heart. Spectators wear "Love Coach" T-shirts at UH football games and unfurl "Love Coach" banners in the end zones.

Those fans include satisfied advisees. Recalls Helton proudly, "One woman asked whether or not she should marry a man who wanted her to move with him to Miami -- over her children's objections. I told her I didn't let children make my decisions for me. They're going to leave home at 18 anyway. She soon invited me to her wedding in Miami, and told me her daughter is happy now."

-- Debbie Markley

Listeners can share their heartache with the Love Coach at 8 a.m. Friday through November 20 on