Madden Continues Sports Emmy Win Streak at Annual Awards

CBS’ John Madden maintained his streak of winning a Sports Emmy each time he has been nominated and the network captured five other statuettes at the 13th annual Sports Emmy Awards. ABC, NBC, ESPN and Home Box Office captured five each.

Madden was cited as the outstanding sports personality-analyst of 1991, beating out fellow CBS announcers Tim McCarver and Terry Bradshaw, ABC’s Dan Dierdorf and Jim Valvano of ABC and ESPN. It was the eighth Emmy for the former Oakland Raiders coach, and the sixth in as many years.

In ceremonies Monday night in New York City, CBS was also cited for outstanding live sports series (the NCAA men’s basketball tournament), technical team remote (the World Series), technical team studio (“The NFL Today”) and for opens/closes/teases (for both the first game of the American League championship series and the NCAA men’s basketball semifinals).

Another big winner was the Gowdy family. Curt Gowdy, believed to be the only sportscaster to have worked for all three major networks and PBS, received the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences’ lifetime achievement award, joining Jim McKay (1989) and Lindsey Nelson (1990). Gowdy’s son, Curt Jr., took two statuettes, as coordinating producer of “ABC’s Wide World of Sports 30th Anniversary Special,” which was named the outstanding edited sports special, and for a feature on Lyle Sukkert, a one-armed, mentally retarded Special Olympics swimmer.

NBC’s Bob Costas took his third Emmy as outstanding sports personality-host, and the Costas-hosted “NFL Live” shared an Emmy for best studio show with ESPN’s “NFL Gameday.”