PHOENIX -- When the Sequoyah High girls basketball team from Tahlequah, Okla., played its first game at the 2007 Nike Tournament of Champions, I was so intrigued I nearly forgot to take notes. The team from a high school operated by Oklahoma's Cherokee Nation was petite but speedy, and it worked for them.
Though very few people aside from my parents would ever guess, I am Cherokee. Born and raised far from the Native American side of my family, or any affiliation with our tribe, I couldn't have told you the difference between fry bread and an elephant ear until last July.
I don't look a lick Native, other than my cheekbones and an uncanny ability to make sunburns dissolve into tans. My Native American heritage -- one that I've never ignored but also never taken the time to seek out -- comes through in bits and pieces.
That trip to Phoenix eight months ago was my first exposure to anything that even resembled "rez ball."
Fast-forward seven months and, in my return to Phoenix, I arrived at North High School to watch Angel Goodrich, her sister Nikki Lewis, and two Sequoyah teammates take the court as part of a team in the sixth-annual Native American Basketball Invitational.
This time, I had a small idea of what I was about to witness.
The buzzer sounded and Team Anonymous, named by coach Fayth Goodrich Lewis because she "didn't want anyone to know who (they) are," was never threatened in the first pool game. In fact, many of the pool games had a similar look -- the stronger team raced off to a double-digit lead, often before the other team could score a bucket.
"We just have such a different style," said April Christie, a guard from Kirtland, N.M., for the Navajo Nation Lady Cats. "When you go and play with other girls, they're not used to your no-look passes. And it's just such a quicker speed."
All the girls were of a fast and furious breed, with the rare post player in tow. I was at eye level with many of the girls on the court at a high school basketball tournament for the first time.
However, what they lacked in height compared to their non-Native opponents, they more than make up for in speed.
It wasn't a skill I necessarily expected the kids to have. The fat, lazy and drunk stereotype is often the only image of Native Americans portrayed in mainstream media. Even when you know it's not true -- from the annual Pow-Wows my family attended each summer in Seattle to the trip I took through Cherokee, N.C., a year ago -- it is still difficult to change the mindset.
But the first game was a quick flashback to the TOC -- Goodrich and Lewis sailed around teams that couldn't keep up past half court, except this time, most of the opposing teams could just as easily return the favor. Teams ran each other from baseline to baseline for entire games, throwing up as many threes as fast-break layups, and didn't even look winded by the end. They dove to the floor in steal attempts, raced back to defense like their livelihoods depended on it and came into timeouts smiling.
Wait, smiling?
With the ferocious style of play, my first surprise was the girls' attitudes. There are no big rivalries that carry themselves past the buzzer, no interest in payback from a defeat the previous year and, often, no preference as to the opponent.
"It doesn't really matter who we play," Lewis said, in a sentiment echoed by other players during the tournament. "We just come out to play and have fun."
For the players, little has changed since NABI became the first all-Native tournament to be certified by the NCAA two years ago. Pat Summitt and Geno Auriemma aren't magically knocking on their doors, but special players have started to put Native teams on the map. Goodrich heads to Kansas' program this year, while Lewis and at least a half-dozen other young players have the spark to contribute to a college program.
"It's a good feeling to have this tournament," said Tania Hatathlie, a member of the Arizona Hoops team that lost to the Lady Cats in the semifinals. Hatathlie and one of her teammates will play for Blackhawk College in Illinois this year. "You want to see who's the best of the best, not just in your state or on your reservation, but nationally."
As much as the players are largely unknown to college coaches, the ESPN HoopGurlz staff needed exposure to the culture. I knew beforehand that the NABI experience would not have been complete without one side trip for dinner. Countless times, I've heard my dad, who grew up in the hills of Asheville, N.C., talk about hominy stew among the delicious Southern food his mother, a full-blooded Cherokee, cooked for him and his nine siblings.
So even though I didn't know what hominy -- dried and treated maize (corn) kernels -- was, we ventured 15 miles East to a hole-in-the-wall restaurant full of strip-mall charm. We tried hominy stew -- not my thing but definitely worth a taste -- fry bread, Indian tacos and a fry-bread dessert, all while flipping through the Navajo Times and The Native Voice.
Other than an unexpected addition to my favorite foods -- I'm now on an apparently hopeless search for fry bread in the Pacific Northwest -- another pleasant surprise was the support the players and teams received from fans.
People filled the stands from the first days at North High and the Pi-Copa and LEHI gyms, to the boys' and girls' semifinals and championships at Phoenix's U.S. Airways Center -- the home of the NBA's Phoenix Suns and the WNBA's Mercury. Weekday pool games at 11 a.m. packed parking lots and left fans squished into standing room-only sections. The USAC started collecting fans for the 8 a.m. semifinal and kept bringing them in the rest of the day, through four semifinal games, two third-place games and the girls' and boys' championships.
Late afternoon on trophy day, Goodrich's team squared off against the strong and equally-dominating Navajo Nation Lady Cats in the girls' championship. In stylish, "rez ball" form, Goodrich and Lewis won the game on a half-court steal, speedy layup and clutch free throws in the final seconds. There was joyful hugging and crying before the teams shook hands and were recognized at the end, then a moment of quiet celebration for the Goodrich-Lewis family.
Nearly an hour later, as the girls from Team Anonymous packed up their bags for the final time at the U.S. Airways Center -- now traveling with a trophy -- Native American dancers came to half court for a half time performance during the boys' championship, I stopped mid-deadline to take in the exhibit. It was the final reminder to me that NABI wasn't just another basketball tournament, it was also a culture coming together to support its next generation.
As a Cherokee, I wanted to be part of that.
