JOURNAL SPORTS
NATCHITOCHES – Vastly accomplished sportswriters John James Marshall of Shreveport and New Orleans native Gil LeBreton have been selected for the 2026 Distinguished Service Award in Sports Journalism from the Louisiana Sports Writers Association.
The duo will be inducted June 27 in the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame, LSWA president John Marcase and Hall of Fame chairman Doug Ireland announced Wednesday.
Marshall has been a columnist and writer for the Shreveport-Bossier Journal since its founding in early 2022. He is also a popular sports talk show co-host weekday afternoons from 5-6 on 1130 KWKH-AM in Shreveport.
Both LeBreton and Marshall have been broadly acclaimed by the LSWA and national organizations. Marshall has won a national award from Associated Press Sports Editors and a large collection of LSWA honors. Both have won the LSWA “Story of the Year” award. LeBreton is the only person named by the National Sports Media Association as the top sportswriter in both Louisiana and Texas.
Marshall continues to make wide-ranging impact with his coverage of sports from the professional level down to high school and amateur competition, and his long-running sports talk radio show. LeBreton, a distinguished LSU graduate, began his career as one of the state’s top young sportswriters in New Orleans and Baton Rouge before 37 years covering top-level sports events for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
The DSA honor, to be made official this summer in Natchitoches, means LeBreton and Marshall will be among an elite 12-person Class of 2026 being inducted in the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame. They were elected from a 25-person pool of outstanding nominees for the state’s top sports journalism honor.
The Distinguished Service Award in Sports Journalism recipients are chosen by the 35-member Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame selection committee based on nominees’ professional accomplishments in local, state, regional and even national circles, with leadership in the LSWA as a beneficial factor and three decades of work in the profession as a requirement.
Distinguished Service Award winners are enshrined in the Hall of Fame along with the 503 current athletes, sports journalists, coaches and administrators chosen since 1959. Just 77 leading figures in the state’s sports media have been honored with the Distinguished Service Award since its inception 43 years ago in 1982.
“Gil and J.J. are two of the top sports journalists in the country and deserving of the Distinguished Service Award in Sports Journalism,” said Marcase.
“J.J. has been a trendsetter in many ways. There is little he has not done or accomplished in sports media, from sports information to sports reporting to sports commentating to being an innovative journalism instructor. Yet, in everything he has done and continues to do, he does so at the highest level possible,” Marcase said.
“Sports fans in Northwest Louisiana are fortunate that J.J. never left the region and that he continues to chronicle sports in print online and on the long-running and trailblazing radio show he hosts with his brother, Ben.
“Gil may have made his mark in Texas in the fiercely competitive Dallas/Fort Worth market, but his Louisiana roots run deep and he continues to return home on a regular basis. He has not forgotten his home state and he has been a welcome and familiar sight each June at the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame festivities and Louisiana Sports Writers Association meetings held in conjunction with the Hall of Fame since retiring,” said Marcase.
“Gil’s versatility as a reporter and later a columnist served his readers well, and truly showcased his talents.”
LeBreton and Marshall will be among a star-studded Class of 2026.
Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame 2025 inductee Sylvia Fowles, NFL stars Joe Horn, Todd McClure and Pat Williams, Major League Baseball All-Star Jonathan Lucroy and legendary basketball coaches John Brady, Mike McConathy and Dewain Strother are the eight-member group of competitors’ ballot inductees chosen for 2026 induction.
For the third time this decade, the Hall will present the Louisiana Sports Ambassador Award, this time inducting Warren Morris into the LSHOF. The Alexandria native and resident whose walk-off home run won the 1996 College World Series for LSU and resulted in the Bolton High School product becoming a lifelong spokesman for college baseball, the CWS and LSU.
The 2026 recipient of the Hall’s Dave Dixon Louisiana Sports Leadership Award will be announced today and will also be enshrined in the LSHOF.
The 2026 Induction Class will be celebrated June 25-27 in Natchitoches. Opportunities to purchase admission for the four ticketed events are available at the LaSportsHall.com website through the www.LaSportsHall.com/induction26 link.
A versatile Shreveport journalist, Marshall has been involved in local media since 1974 when he began covering American Legion baseball games for the Shreveport Times. He was 15. He has become a four-time LSWA Prep Writer of the Year, a two-time Columnist of the Year, and with his brother Ben, has twice won the LSWA’s Best Radio Show contest.
He was a co-winner in 1987 of the APSE’s national Best Feature Sports Story award. In 2023, Marshall won the LSWA’s Story of the Year award. Notably, once the Shreveport Journal folded, Marshall did not enter the LSWA writing contest for 27 years but has won multiple awards in the last four years writing for the Shreveport-Bossier Journal.
Meanwhile, ”SportsTalk with Bonzai Ben and JJ” on 50,000-watt KWKH-AM is the longest running radio sports talk show in Louisiana.
At age 31, he became one of the youngest to be elected as LSWA president. He also served on, and currently serves on, the LSWA’s Hall of Fame committee.
After graduating from Louisiana Tech in 1981 (where he worked with DSA winner Teddy Allen as sports editor of The Tech Talk), he began at the Shreveport Journal and went on to become the Executive Sports Editor in 1988, alongside DSA icon Jerry Byrd as senior columnist.
As a documentary producer, Marshall won two CASE awards for video production/story telling. He has been the play-by-play announcer in radio/TV in professional football (CFL’s Shreveport Pirates) and Division I basketball (Centenary College). He was a PA announcer for the Shreveport Captains for eight years and was a part-time PA voice for the Houston Astros.
The baseball press box at Loyola College Prep is named for him. Marshall has been media director/instructor at his alma mater, Loyola, for 29 years, and in 2014 was inducted into the Loyola Hall of Honor. At Jesuit High (now Loyola), he played quarterback for the Flyers’ Class 3A state championship team in 1976. He was also an All-City third baseman.
LeBreton covered 26 Super Bowls, 13 World Series,16 Olympic Games (nine summer, seven winter), 16 NCAA Basketball Final Fours, soccer’s World Cup, The Masters, the Tour de France, the NBA Finals, hockey’s Stanley Cup Finals and the Wimbledon tennis championships. He covered sporting events in France, Spain, Germany, Norway, Greece, United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Argentina and Canada, as well as in 40 of the 50 states.
His one-on-one interviews included Muhammad Ali (at his log cabin training camp in Deer Lake, Pa.), Tom Landry, Nolan Ryan, John Wooden, Jack Nicklaus, Lance Armstrong, John McEnroe, Martina Navratilova, Mike Tyson, Bruce Jenner, O.J. Simpson, Pete Rozelle and President George W. Bush.