Office of Sports and Entertainment
ATTN: Florida-Georgia
117 W. Duval Street; Suite 280
Jacksonville, FL 32202
Local: (904) 630-3690
Toll Free: 1-844-333-GAFL (4235)
Assistance: (904) 630-SAFE (7233)
Everbank Field: (904) 633-6100
Email: events@coj.net
Lead Play-by-Play Announcer
SEC ON CBS College Football
Verne Lundquist is CBS Sports’ lead play-by-play announcer for college football. He teams with Gary Danielson and Allie LaForce to call the popular SEC ON CBS package featuring the “SEC Game of the Week.” Lundquist has been the lead voice of CBS Sports’ college football coverage since 2000. September 2016 marks his 54th year in broadcasting.
During his tenure at CBS, Lundquist has broadcast more than 20 different sports for the Network, including broadcasting NFL games for 13 years. He also is currently a play-by-play announcer for CBS Sports’ coverage of NCAA basketball, including the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championship. Lundquist has been announcing the NCAA Tournament for 32 consecutive years.
In addition, Lundquist is part of the GOLF ON CBS team. He marked his 20th PGA Championship in July 2016. Lundquist also joined the CBS Sports Masters® announce team in 1983 and has called the action at Augusta National every year except 1997-98, in addition to several other PGA TOUR events.
Lundquist was the lead play-by-play announcer for figure skating at the 1992, 1994 and 1998 Olympic Winter Games. He also had extensive involvement in CBS Sports’ previous coverage of the NBA. Among the 20 different sports Lundquist has broadcast for CBS include track and field, swimming and diving, boxing, volleyball, gymnastics, soccer, weightlifting, free style skiing, archery, horse racing and horse jumping, and was a regular member of the Network’s golf team (1983-95).
Lundquist worked with Terry Bradshaw, who he presented at the Pro Football Hall of Fame induction ceremonies in Canton, Ohio, as well as Dan Fouts, and occasionally with lead analyst John Madden, on the Network’s NFL broadcasts. He worked at ABC Sports from 1974-81 and three years as play-by-play announcer for TNT’s NFL, NBA, golf and figure skating coverage (1995-97).
Well known in Texas as the long-time radio voice of the Dallas Cowboys (1972-84), he was sports director at WFAA-TV in Dallas for 16 years. Lundquist began his career at KTBC-TV in Austin, a station owned by President and Mrs. Lyndon Johnson. Lundquist has played himself in three movies, including Happy Gilmore. He was born July 17, 1940, in Duluth, Minn., and grew up in Everett, Wash. and Austin, Texas.
Lundquist was inducted into the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame in 2007. Most recently, he was honored in May 2016 with the Sports Emmy Award for Lifetime Achievement. He was inducted into the Texas Radio Hall of Fame in 2003. He won seven consecutive Texas Sportscaster of the Year Awards (1977-83). Lundquist was inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in 2005. It was the first time in the 55-year history of the Texas Sports Hall of Fame that members of the media were inducted. Lundquist was part of the inaugural class along with seven other legendary sportscasters and sports writers. He also was named the 2005 Legend of the Sun Bowl by the Sun Bowl Association. In 2011 he was named co-winner of the award for Outstanding Contribution to Amateur Football by the National Football Foundation and Hall of Fame. In May 2014, Lundquist received the Vin Scully Lifetime Achievement Award in Sports Broadcasting from Fordham University’s WFUV Radio. Also in 2014 he was named as a Distinguished American by the Walter Camp Football Foundation in New Haven, Conn., recognized as the oldest organization in the U.S. devoted to college football, and was given the Blackie Sherrod Lifetime Achievement Award by the North Texas Final Four Organizing Committee. In 2015, he and Gary Danielson were honored with the Maxwell Football Club’s Excellence in Broadcasting. Also that year, Lundquist was honored with the Charles Ringler Founders’ Award by the Davey O’Brien Football Foundation and the Jake Wade Memorial Award by the College Sports Information Directors Association.
Among his other honors, Lundquist was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Bobby Bragan Youth Foundation, and named as a Champion in Sports Business by the Sports Business Journal, the first on-air person ever so honored.
Lundquist earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology from Texas Lutheran University in 1962 and received the school’s Distinguished Alumnus Award. He also is a member of Texas Lutheran’s Board of Regents. He lives in Steamboat Springs, Colo., with his wife, Nancy, where they serve on the Board of Directors of the summer chamber music festival, “Strings Music Festival.” Most recently, the Lundquists were named the Yampa Valley Community Foundation’s “Philanthropist of the Year” in Steamboat Springs.
