Mathys Lefebvre’s (luh-FEV-re) constant desire to improve and learn have been assets in his football (soccer) career, which has taken him from French powerhouse Olympique Lyonnais’ academy & Pro 2 team to the University of Pittsburgh. Those same qualities are driving him to learn as much as he can about the climate crisis and to be a difference maker in Le #ClimateComeback!

A native of Paris, Lefebvre got started a little late on the pitch but quickly demonstrated that he had talent.

“I didn’t really play much until I was nine or ten,” he recalled. “Many of my friends got going at five, six and seven. Starting as an offensive midfielder, I guess I showed coaches that I was good as I was quickly moved up to play with older kids. At one point, when I tried out for an under 13 ‘preformation program’, I got down to the final round but ended up not getting picked because I played with a small club. I vowed this would never happen again.”

That experience led him to seek a middle school and a high school where he could be a student and would have the time to play football that would allow him to reach his potential on the pitch.

“During middle school I played with AC Boulogne Billancourt, near the PSG stadium,” noted Lefebvre. “They had a reputation for being a good place for up-and-coming kids. I started to become visible to bigger pro clubs.”

One of those clubs was Olympique Lyonnais in Lyon, a perennial contender in Ligue 1, the top flight of French football.

“Lyon called me, I tried out for them at their Academy, and they came to see me play,” he shared. “They wanted me to start at the under-16 level. I was very happy because they are considered one of the top five clubs in Europe in terms of youth player development.”

Lefebvre moved to Lyon, about a two-and-a-half-hour train ride southeast of Paris, for the last two years of high school. The transition was hard at first.

“It was a challenge, leaving home and going to a new city,” admitted Lefebvre. “Also, football went from being fun to being a job as I had a three-year contract, living in a dorm for the first two and then in an apartment for the third. I got to train every day with fantastic coaching and then played games on the weekend. As I got better and better, I enjoyed it more and more.”

His contract took him through the last two years of high school and one year at the Amos Sport Business School in Lyon.

“It was very interesting to study the sport business industry,” he offered. “I split my time between projects and internships, including one with a pro rugby club that was fascinating. The academic side was a great counterpoint to what I was doing on the pitch. And there I was improving all the way through the end of my three-year contract.”

As that deal was ending, a moment of truth of sorts was coming up for Lefebvre: Would Lyon want to invest in him a second time?

“Lyon offered me a second contract, this one for two years,” recalled Lefebvre. “They had me on the under-19s, which was the last generation of the academy process. Then I moved up to second team and sometimes trained with the first team. This meant I was getting me closer to the top tier of professional football!”

An ankle injury and subsequent surgery in the first year of his second contract slowed LeFebvre’s progress but he rebounded the next year to play well with Lyon’s second team, getting closer to making it to the top.

Then it came time for the next contract…and a big inflection point for Lefebvre: “While I hoped for a third contract, I knew there was a possibility that it wouldn’t come to pass. And truth was I wanted to play and still get a degree. Going to the US would be a great way to do both, while having a rich life experience. It was then a joint decision between the club and me that I would try this new road for European players: America!”

The University of Pittsburgh caught his eye almost immediately — its world class business school (Lefebvre is an Economics major), the perennial top 10 men’s soccer program (he’d have two years of athletic eligibility), and the city itself all made the choice an easy one. So, Lefebvre enrolled at Pitt for the fall 2022 semester. From a soccer perspective, his first season with the Panthers was a success…but left him and his teammates wanting more.

“I had to get used to the different style of play in US college soccer versus the European style,” he suggested. “In the US, it’s more of a commitment to team, whereas in Europe, the focus is more tactical and technical. We had a decent regular season, qualified for the NCAA tournament, and made an exciting run to the Final Four, where we fell 2-0 to Indiana in the semifinal. I feel like we had chances but couldn’t convert. So, now we know what we have to do this fall.”

Lefebvre is keeping his post-graduation options open — playing in MLS is a possibility and so is a return to Europe. But for now, his soccer focus is on doing what he can to get the Pitt Panthers back to the Final Four and to come home with the trophy.

As for his passion for climate and the environment, Lefebvre got a taste of the Green-Sports world at an early age.

“I had the chance to be an Adidas athlete since I went to Lyon and Olympique Lyonnais is an Adidas club; their representatives were around the training complex all the time,” he said. “Participating in brand events gave me the chance to understand their collaboration with Parley for the Oceans jerseys, an organization that fights against plastic ocean pollution by partnering with Adidas to make apparel from plastic ocean waste. The more I learned about the company’s efforts to reduce its carbon footprint, the more interested I got. I thought, this is the kind of thing that is necessary for us to have a healthy present and future.”

Fast-forward to last spring and Lefebvre continued his connection to Adidas by getting selected for an initiative created with Parley called ‘Ocean Uprise’, an internship designed to build awareness of plastic pollution and ocean protection. His challenge was to find ways to link climate activists, sports, and environmental action. His solution? Create a podcast series to do just that.

“Each episode will pair a guest from the sports world and another from the climate activist arena,” he explained. “We will have a companion e-magazine with a list of resources for each podcast to make solutions easily accessible for the audience. The goals are to inspire our listeners to take action and I will learn a lot about how to communicate on climate.”

Becoming an EcoAthletes Champion will help accelerate Lefebvre’s climate communications skills. It will also enhance his knowledge about ways to use his platform as an athlete to help support the protection of our environment.

“Being an EcoAthletes Champion is exactly what I want to do,” he asserted. “I believe that the Champions network will drive climate action through content, networking and more. I look forward to learning from and supporting my fellow Champions.”

“As a midfielder, Mathys has to think and act creatively on the pitch,” EcoAthletes CEO and founder Lew Blaustein noted. “We can already see, through his podcast project, that Mathys is thinking and acting creatively on climate and that is a great thing for the Champions network and for the #ClimateComeback. We are thrilled to have him!”

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