For more than three decades, Baton Rouge residents have had one surefire way of knowing whether the prep sporting event they were attending was the biggest one on the docket that night.
If Robin Fambrough was there, then you were in the right place.
Now the veteran journalist — a dogged, meticulous reporter whose encyclopedic memory and zeal for storytelling shined through the copy she filed — has decided to retire, ending a legendary 34-year tenure as Louisian’s prep sports beat writer. Her last day on the job is Aug. 1.
“I had a great career because of the people I’ve covered and the stories I’ve gotten to write,” Fambrough said. “I’ve had to cover a lot of really great athletes and meet a lot of really great coaches.”
Fambrough, a native of Louisville, Kentucky, fell in love with sports around childhood stops at college basketball games and trips to Churchill Downs. She played on her high school’s first girls basketball team, then covered its first win two years later.
A decorated sportswriting career followed, whisking her from western Kentucky, to Thibodaux, to Alexandria, then Hollywood, Florida, and finally to Baton Rouge.
There, Fambrough encountered all-time greats — think Warrick Dunn, Marcus Spears and Seimone Augustus, to name a few — and wrote the earliest chapters of their careers. Since 1981, she's covered her fair share of stars, but not at the expense of the everyday athletes, the ones whose playing careers ended in high school.
She mined every sport — in every classification — for their stories, then told them the only way she knew how — with grace, precision, care and an exacting consideration for detail.
“She did an article on me,” Augustus said, “and I was a shy little kid, and most of my answers were ‘Yes’ and ‘No,’ and I just remember how caring she was, how she pulled the information out of me without overwhelming me, with it being my first interview. And that's basically how we got started, and throughout my high school career, college career, Robin was the same person. She interviewed me the same way.”
Fambrough is the first reporter who wrote about Augustus. The two met when the future LSU and WNBA great was just a gangly 9-year-old still growing into her Chuck Taylors. Fambrough covered her storied career at Capitol High, then watched her star ascend in college and the professional ranks. She even flew to Springfield, Massachusetts, in 2024 to document Augustus’ induction into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
“I would credit her a lot for helping me with my ability to interview,” Augustus said, “with how genuine she was and how thorough she was throughout that process.”
Every week for three decades, Fambrough mixed event coverage with collections of news and notes while sprinkling in feature stories — some inspiring and triumphant, others tragic and heart-rending. Sometimes, she’d encounter chances to hold power to account and decide not to let them slip away, penning that untangled thorny issues facing the LHSAA.
“She brought credibility to what we were doing,” LHSAA executive director Eddie Bonine said. “She got it. She understood, and she was old-school in that regard, but she changed as the times changed.”
What never changed was Fambrough’s commitment to covering every sport.
On Friday nights, she’d finish her story on a football game and drive home late at night only to wake up early on Saturday morning so she could cover a swim meet or a cross country event.
Fambrough watched the high-profile recruits. She’d also look for diamonds in the rough, then give them the spotlight she thought they deserved.
“She covers our sports,” Zachary girls basketball coach Tami McClure said. “She really takes into consideration that girls’ sports are important. It’s not just about the boys but everyone. It’s not just the girls. Every sport is important to her and to this community, and then she gets it across to everyone and covers everyone as everyone should be covered.”
Said longtime Episcopal coach Claney Duplechin: “She was the reason that cross country, I would say, gained popularity in Baton Rouge and grew at the level it grew over the last 30 years.”
Fambrough, 68, was inducted into the h Sports Hall of Fame (2020) and the h High School Sports Hall of Fame (2019). She’s also a seven-time winner of the h Sports Writers Association Prep Writer of the Year award, recognition she earned in four different decades. In 2000 — about a dozen years after she moved to Baton Rouge with her husband, Kevin, and her daughter, Megan — she was named the h Sports Writers Association’s first female president.
Then, in 2022, Fambrough became the first woman to receive the National Sports Media Association h Sportswriter of the Year award.
“I consider her the mother of high school sports,” said Baton Rouge Mayor-President Sid Edwards, a former longtime prep football coach. “In order for high school sports to work, in order for it to have any juice, it’s got to have a Robin Fambrough. She’s one of one, in my opinion.”
Fambrough wants everyone to remember her work for one reason, above all else.
“What I hope people take from me is that I think everything matters,” Fambrough said. “All sports matter. I like to think I tried to balance it as best I could.”
