Gil LeBreton

Sport: Distinguished Service Award in Sports Journalism

Induction Year: 2026

University: LSU

In a sportswriting career spanning more than five decades, beginning with the Times-Picayune in his hometown of New Orleans, Gil LeBreton was regarded among the country’s elite professionals. He spent 37 years as an award-winning sports columnist with the Fort Worth Star-Telegram after he was a beat reporter covering LSU and the Saints on the staffs of the Picayune and later the Baton Rouge Morning Advocate. His other newspaper stops were in Kansas City and Baltimore, as well as serving as Publicity Director for the 1975 World Football League’s Birmingham team. He remains the only writer to win state Sportswriter of the Year awards (given by the NSMA) in both Louisiana and Texas.

After serving with the U.S. Army in Vietnam, LeBreton returned home to Louisiana and graduated with a degree in journalism from LSU. He spent three years in the school’s Sports Information Office under DSA winner Paul Manasseh. LeBreton covered 26 Super Bowls, 13 World Series,16 Olympic Games (9 summer, 7 winter), 16 NCAA Basketball Final Fours, soccer’s World Cup, the Masters, the Tour de France, the NBA Finals, hockey’s Stanley Cup Finals and the Wimbledon tennis championships. He saw Muhammad Ali box, Paul Newman drive a race car and Prince Albert try to steer a bobsled. He has covered sporting events in France, Spain, Germany, Norway, Greece, United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Argentina and Canada, as well as in 40 of the 50 states. His one-on-one interviews over the years have included the great Ali (at his log cabin training camp in Deer Lake, Pa.), Tom Landry, Nolan Ryan, John Wooden, Jack Nicklaus, Lance Armstrong, John McEnroe, Martina Navratilova, Mike Tyson, Bruce Jenner, O.J. Simpson, Pete Rozelle and President George W. Bush.

LeBreton’s reporting from the Olympic Games won numerous state and national awards. His stories for the Picayune on Louisiana Olympic hopefuls before the 1976 Montreal Games were honored as the LSWA’s top series, the same year that his column on the one-year anniversary of the WFL’s demise was the LSWA’s story of the year. LeBreton was honored in October 2024 when the LSU Manship School of Mass Communications inducted him into its Hall of Fame. Born 11-30-48 in New Orleans.