NATCHITOCHES, La. — Former Southern head coach Pete Richardson is among eight former Lousiana sports legends who will enter the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame as a part of the class of 2012 announced Saturday night by the Louisiana Sports Writers Association.
LSWA unveiled the 2012 class during a live broadcast on “CST Tonight.”
At SU, Richardson had four 11-win seasons — including a 12-1 run in 2003. His career record, including five seasons at Division II Winston-Salem State, was 176-76-1. Over a 17-year span, Richardson defined Southern football and, with 134 wins, is second all-time in wins behind only College Football Hall of Fame coach A.W. Mumford.
The Dayton, Ohio, native joins four other gridiron legends, headlined by star NFL running backs Deuce McAllister of the New Orleans Saints and Baton Rouge native Warrick Dunn. Another remarkable running back, LSU great Terry Robiskie, joins Louisiana Tech pass catching sensation Roger Carr in the five-man football component going into the Hall this summer.
Three-time Grambling basketball All-American Aaron James, a New Orleans native, joins LSU baseball stalwart Eddy Furniss and nationally-acclaimed jockey Mark Guidry, a Lafayette native, in the Hall’s 2012 induction class.
The 2012 class will be officially enshrined Saturday, June 23, 2012 in Natchitoches to culminate the June 21-23 Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame Induction Celebration.
A 30-member Louisiana Sports Writers Association committee selected the 2012 inductees. The panel considered a record 142 nominees from 24 different sport categories on a 25-page ballot, said Hall of Fame chairman Doug Ireland.
Richardson was 12-5 in the Bayou Classic and is the only SWAC coach never to have lost to Eddie Robinson.
His winning percentage of 68.4 percent in 17 seasons (134-62) at the school is second behind only Mumford’s 70.4 percent (176-60-14). Prior to his arrival, Southern had last won the SWAC in 1975 and 1966. The program had four different head coaches in the 1970s and four between 1981 and 1992.
The 2012 inductions will be conducted as construction nears completion on the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame museum, operated by the Louisiana State Museum system in a partnership with the Louisiana Sports Writers Association. The striking two-story, 27,500-square foot structure faces Cane River Lake in the National Historic Landmark District of Natchitoches and should be completed this summer with installation of cutting-edge exhibits following over the next few months.
The eight new inductees will raise the total of Hall of Fame members to 292 men and women honored since the first induction class – baseball’s Mel Ott, world champion boxer Tony Canzoneri and LSU football great Gaynell Tinsley – were enshrined in 1959 after their election a year earlier.
The Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame includes nine members of the Basketball Hall of Fame, six of the NBA’s 50 Greatest Players, six baseball Hall of Fame inductees, 13 Pro Football Hall of Fame members, seven Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame enshrines, 18 Olympic medalists (10 gold medal winners), 32 College Football Hall of Fame members, three National High School Hall of Fame enshrines, jockeys with a combined 12 Triple Crown victories, six world boxing champions, three College Baseball Hall of Fame inductees (Furniss will be the fourth), three NBA Finals MVPs and two Super Bowl MVPs. A complete membership list and biographical information on all 285 current members is available at the www.lasportshall.com website, with a steady stream of info available at the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame Facebook page.
The 2012 Induction Celebration will kick off Thursday, June 21 with the La Capitol press conference and reception. It includes three receptions, a Friday morning youth sports clinic sponsored by the Natchitoches Parish Sheriff’s Office, and a Friday afternoon Encana Gas celebrity pro-am golf scramble at Oak Wing Golf Course in Alexandria. Tickets for the Chesapeake Energy Induction Dinner and Ceremonies, and golf entries, will go on sale in April through the www.lasportshall.com website, said Hall of Fame Foundation president/chief executive officer Lisa Babin.
Also to be honored at the event will be two other Hall of Fame inductees, the winner of the 2012 Dave Dixon Louisiana Sports Leadership Award and the recipient of the 2012 Distinguished Service Award in Sports Journalism presented by the LSWA. Those award recipients will be announced in the spring.
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Richardson get La. Hall of fame nod
February 1, 2012
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