Hunters make community proud

The Hunters’ Founder’s Cup win is the biggest cherry on top that any Kahnawake sports fan could ask for. Not only does it build on an incredible playoff run, with a resilience-boasting reverse sweep to take the Ontario Junior B Lacrosse League finals championship for the first time, but to put pedal to metal and take the mantle of best in the country, and to do it undefeated?

To put it mildly, it encapsulates and rewards everything this community has done for years to support its young athletes.

Kahnawa’kehró:non know the community’s future is only as strong as its young people, and the level of commitment, energy, passion, hard work, you name it that made this success possible is phenomenal. And just imagine what it means to the community’s youngest, who have this group to look up to and this achievement to aspire to.

It’s truly a community effort when Kahnawake youth succeed. Elders, parents, aunts and uncles, cousins and brothers and sisters, teachers, coaches, neighbours, the list of relations is endless and the impact they can have limitless.

Just looking at the roster, we know so many of these players from writing stories about Kahnawake’s incredible minor lacrosse system, a system bursting with parents, coaches, and others who dedicate so much of their time and themselves to teaching community youth not only how to play the game, but what it means.

Learning the Creator’s game involves more than just passing and shooting the ball or drilling how to play tight defence. It requires discipline and diligence. It means not just learning to play the game but to play it with respect - for yourself, for your teammates, and for your opponent.

Some of our favourite sports stories to write don’t include countrywide accolades. In fact, sometimes they don’t include accolades at all. Sometimes the most inspiring stories are about losing gracefully and aspiring to do better next time. They are about grit, compassion, and diligence, win or lose.

After all, sports are like life. We always tell new reporters that sports stories are like any other, just with box scores. At the end of the day, they’re about human beings.

Look at the Hunters. How much sweeter is this year’s win after last year’s heartbreak in the OJBLL finals, or after overcoming an obstacle just to attend?

The Hunters told The Eastern Door last year that their rallying word all season was resilience. Well, what shows resilience better than what they achieved the following season?

We were so pleased this year to learn that the Hunters were going to field their first ever C team to go along with the Junior B squad. The Junior C squad impressed us in their debut year, and the team contributed their share of inspiring tales.

Take Kanehsata’kehró:non Ava Weriasanoron Gabriel of the C squad, the league’s first woman to take the floor outside the net, also earning the distinction of becoming the first woman to score in the league. She played alongside her brother, Logan Gabriel, who earned distinction with an incredible season as one of the best players on the team. What a great story as well!

The Hunters gave so much to the community this year, and the community gave so much back. It’s the kind of reciprocity that makes a community great.

And at the end of the day, sports is about just that: community. And that’s why week after week these remain some of the most important stories in our pages.

Like many activities that Kahnawake pours its resources into, teaching youth lacrosse is about the transmission of culture, of history, of pride in being Onkwehón:we and embodying Onkwehón:we values.

So it’s no surprise that as the Hunters wondered how they were going to get to Calgary when their flights were cancelled because of labour disruptions at Air Canada, the community rallied behind them and pulled off the impressive feat of chartering an airplane at a moment when tons of folks around the country were wondering how they were going to get from point A to B.

And it’s no surprise that as Kahnawa’kehró:non (and Kanehsata’kehró:non, who also take pride in the team) went about their business from August 18-24, they had one eye on the score sheet or the live feed as they had their hair cut or trained or did anything else.

The Kahnawake Hunters are Kahnawake’s team, and the Kahnawake spirit was hard to miss.

How will the Hunters’ victory in the Founder’s Cup impact and inspire the next generation of Kahnawake athletes, the next generation of Kahnawa’kehró:non period?

Only time will tell, but as the community gathers today to celebrate the Hunters’ with a parade, enjoy the moment. A countrywide championship doesn’t come easy, and it doesn’t come often.

Go Hunters!

TED Staff