Jerry Tipton

Beginning with the 1981-82 season, sportswriter Jerry Tipton covered the University of Kentucky men’s basketball program for 41 years. This included nine Final Four appearances (1984, 1993, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2011, 2012, 2014 and 2015) and three national championships (1996, 1998 and 2012). He cherished the many chances to feel like he was writing the first draft of history. This included the 1983 “Dream Game” against Louisville, the so-called Christian Laettner game and Kentucky’s 38-0 start to the 2014-15 season. Memorable “lows” in his time included the tornado that hit the 2008 Southeastern Conference Tournament, the historic loss to 15-seed Saint Peter’s in his last game on the beat and the NCAA investigation that led to Eddie Sutton’s firing.

Besides reporting on six basketball coaches (Joe B. Hall, Eddie Sutton, Rick Pitino, Tubby Smith, Billy Gillispie and John Calipari), Tipton’s 41 years in the sports department of the Lexington Herald-Leader included covering UK’s football team from 1981 through the 1986 season.

Before coming to Lexington, Tipton worked 10 years for the daily newspaper in Huntington, W.Va., The Herald-Dispatch. This time included two years as a part-timer while attending Marshall University and eight years full-time after graduating with a degree in journalism in 1973. During this time, he covered high school sports, bowling and then Marshall’s men’s basketball.

He was inducted into the Marshall University Journalism Hall of Fame in 2018, the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame in 2020 and the United States Basketball Writers Association Hall of Fame in 2005.
Tipton grew up in Hamtramck, Mich., which is one of two independent towns inside the Detroit city limits. He and his wife, Paula Anderson, live in Lexington. They have two sons, Stephen and Jackson.