Tewaaraton Award

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Tewaaraton Award
Awarded forTo honor the most outstanding male and female collegiate players, and to recognize the Native American heritage of the sport of lacrosse
Presented byUniversity Club of Washington, D.C., Tewaaraton Foundation
First awarded2001
Currently held byBrennan O'Neill, Izzy Scane
Websitewww.tewaaraton.com

The Tewaaraton Award is an annual award for the most outstanding American college lacrosse men's and women's players, since 2001. It is the lacrosse equivalent of football's Heisman Trophy. The award is presented by The Tewaaraton Foundation and the University Club of Washington, D.C.

Lacrosse is the oldest sport played in North America[1] and the award honors the Native American heritage of lacrosse in the name of its award, "Tewaaraton," the Mohawk name for their game and the progenitor of present-day lacrosse. The Tewaaraton Award has received the endorsement of the Mohawk Nation Council of Elders. Each year, the award recognizes one of the Six Nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy: the Mohawk, Cayuga, Oneida, Onondaga, Seneca and Tuscarora tribes.

Trophy[edit]

The award winners each receive a trophy of a bronze sculpture depicting a Mohawk native playing lacrosse. It was designed and created by Frederick Kail with the assistance of Thomas Vennum, Jr., a renowned Native American lacrosse historian and author, who consulted with Kail to ensure the trophy's historical authenticity. The 12-inch figure is mounted upon a hexagon-shaped slab of black granite and polished Cocobolo wood. The hexagonal base symbolizes the Six Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy: the Mohawk, Cayuga, Oneida, Onondaga, Seneca, and Tuscarora tribes. With some minor decorative exceptions, the stick is a replica of a pre-1845 Cayuga stick belonging to the grandfather of Alexander T. General of the Six Nations Reserve in Ontario. This stick was an original predecessor of the modern-day lacrosse stick.[2]

Replicas of the trophy are given to the winners each year. The original castings of the trophy are part of a permanent collection and are currently on display at the University Club of Washington, D.C.[2][3]

Nomination and selection process[edit]

Players are nominated for the award by coaches from all three NCAA divisions during the collegiate season. All Watch List nominees are then screened and selected by two Selection Committees. The Selection Committees are composed of collegiate coaches, one committee for the men and one committee for the women. At the conclusion of the season the selection committees meet to rank the top five male and female finalists. The finalists are then invited to the Awards Banquet, where the Tewaaraton Award winners are announced.[4][3]

In addition to recognizing the top men’s and women’s collegiate lacrosse players, the Tewaaraton Award in the past has also recognized the High School All-Tewaaraton team for both boys and girls lacrosse. This was a regional team which was composed of the best players from both private and public schools in the Maryland, Washington, D.C., and Virginia area. Although no such list has been released since 2010[5] and there is no mention of it on either the Tewaraaton Awards website nor the University Club of Washington, D.C.'s website.

Ceremony[edit]

Each year the ceremony takes place at the National Museum of the American Indian.[6] Anyone can purchase a ticket to attend the ceremony.[3]

USILA versus Tewaaraton[edit]

There is debate in the lacrosse community as to whether the Tewaaraton Award is actually an outstanding player award or whether it should be called a postseason award. The controversy stems from the fact that the award is usually given to a male player who plays well during the season-ending NCAA tournament and from a team which is the winner or runner up in the NCAA Tournament. The Lt. Raymond Enners Award is the USILA Outstanding Player of the Year Award selected by the NCAA coaches, and the Tewaaraton Award recipient was not the same as the Raymond Enners Award recipient in 5 out of the first 11 years that the Tewaaraton was awarded.[7] Since then, the two awards have agreed almost exactly; in each season but one from 2012 through 2022, both awards were won by the same individual. The only exception in this span was in 2014, when the Enners Award went to one of the two brothers who shared the Tewaaraton Award.

Tewaaraton Award recipients[edit]

Year Men's winner School Position Women's winner School Position
2001 Doug Shanahan Hofstra Midfield Jen Adams Maryland Attack
2002 Mike Powell Syracuse Attack Erin Elbe Georgetown Attack
2003 Chris Rotelli Virginia Midfield Rachael Becker Princeton Defense
2004 Mike Powell Syracuse Attack Amy Appelt Virginia Attack
2005 Kyle Harrison Johns Hopkins Midfield Katie Chrest Duke Attack
2006 Matt Ward Virginia Attack Kristen Kjellman Northwestern Midfield
2007 Matt Danowski Duke Attack Kristen Kjellman Northwestern Midfield
2008 Mike Leveille Syracuse Attack Hannah Nielsen Northwestern Midfield
2009 Max Seibald Cornell Midfield Hannah Nielsen Northwestern Midfield
2010 Ned Crotty Duke Attack Caitlyn McFadden Maryland Midfield
2011 Steele Stanwick Virginia Attack Shannon Smith Northwestern Attack
2012 Peter Baum Colgate Attack Katie Schwarzmann Maryland Midfield
2013 Rob Pannell Cornell Attack Katie Schwarzmann Maryland Midfield
2014 Lyle Thompson Albany Attack Taylor Cummings Maryland Midfield
Miles Thompson
2015 Lyle Thompson Albany Attack Taylor Cummings Maryland Midfield
2016 Dylan Molloy Brown Attack Taylor Cummings Maryland Midfield
2017 Matt Rambo Maryland Attack Zoe Stukenberg Maryland Midfield
2018 Ben Reeves Yale Attack Sam Apuzzo Boston College Attack
2019 Pat Spencer Loyola Attack Megan Taylor Maryland Goalie
2020 No Awards Due to COVID-19
2021 Jared Bernhardt Maryland Attack Charlotte North Boston College Midfield
2022 Logan Wisnauskas Maryland Attack Charlotte North Boston College Midfield
2023 Brennan O'Neill Duke Attack Izzy Scane Northwestern Attack

Men's awards by university[edit]

Rank School Number of Awards Winning Years
T-1 Maryland
3
2017, 2021, 2022
T-1 Syracuse
3
2002, 2004, 2008
T-1 Virginia
3
2003, 2006, 2011
T-1 Duke
3
2007, 2010, 2023
T-4 Cornell
2
2009, 2013
T-4 Albany
2
2014 (2x), 2015
T-7 Hofstra
1
2001
T-7 Brown
1
2016
T-7 Colgate
1
2012
T-7 Johns Hopkins
1
2005
T-7 Loyola (MD)
1
2019
T-7 Yale
1
2018

Women's awards by university[edit]

Rank School Number of Awards Winning Years
1 Maryland
9
2001, 2010, 2012, 2013,
2014, 2015, 2016, 2017,
2019
2 Northwestern
6
2006, 2007, 2008, 2009,
2011, 2023
3 Boston College
3
2018, 2021, 2022
T-4 Duke
1
2005
T-4 Georgetown
1
2002
T-4 Princeton
1
2003
T-4 Virginia
1
2004

Notable Achievements[edit]

  • 2014 was the first year that the award was given to a Native American player. It is also the first, and so far only time the award has been given to two players to share: Lyle Thompson and Miles Thompson, who are both part of the Onondaga Nation, won the award that year.[3]
  • In 2016, Taylor Cummings became the first and so far only three-time recipient of the award.[3]

Tewaaraton Legend Award[edit]

Since 2011, the Tewaaraton Legend Award has been presented to one recipient each year who played collegiately prior to 2001 when the first Tewaaraton Award was presented, whose performance during their college years would have earned them a Tewaaraton Award had the award existed when they played. All awardees received the Enners Award when they played except for Jim Brown and Jimmy Lewis whose playing days preceded the first Enners Award in 1969. In 2016, the foundation began presenting both a men's and women's Legend Award.

Tewaaraton Legend Award Recipients
Year Men's Winner School Women's Winner School
2011 Jim Brown Syracuse - -
2012 Eamon McEneaney Cornell - -
2013 Joe Cowan Johns Hopkins - -
2014 Jimmy Lewis Navy - -
2015 Brad Kotz Syracuse - -
2016 Frank Urso Maryland Candace Finn Rocha Penn State
2017 Peter Cramblet Army Cherie Greer Brown Virginia
2018 Larry Quinn Johns Hopkins Amanda Moore O'Leary Temple
2019 Tom Sears North Carolina Kare Emas Borbee Delaware
2020 No Awards due to COVID 19
2021 No Awards due to COVID 19
2022 Dave Pietramala Johns Hopkins Kelly Amonte Hiller Maryland
2023 Doug Schreiber Maryland Kathleen Geiger Temple

Legends awards by university[edit]

Rank School Number of Awards Winning Years
T-1 Johns Hopkins
3
2013, 2018, 2022
T-1 Maryland
3
2016, 2022, 2023
T-3 Syracuse
2
2011, 2015
T-3 Temple
2
2018, 2023
T-5 Cornell
1
2012
T-5 North Carolina
1
2019
T-5 Delaware
1
2019
T-5 Army
1
2017
T-5 Navy
1
2014
T-5 Virginia
1
2017
T-5 Penn State
1
2016

Spirit of Tewaaraton[edit]

The Spirit of Tewaaraton is presented each year to an individual who has contributed to the sport of lacrosse in a way that reflects the spirit of the values and the mission of the Tewaaraton award. The award was first presented in 2003. Although there have been some years it was not presented, it has been presented each year since 2012 with the exceptions of 2020 and 2021.[8]

Portrait of Tina Sloan Green
Tina Sloan Green awarded in 2016
Spirit of Tewaaraton Winners
Year Winner
2003 A.B. “Buzzy” Krongard
Diane M. Geppi-Aikens
2005 Sid Jamieson
2009 Roy D. Simmons, Jr.
2010 Dick Edell
2012 Richie Moran
2013 Bob Scott
2014 Brendan Looney
2015 Chief Oren Lyons
2016 Tina Sloan Green
2017 George Boiardi
2018 Welles Crowther
2019 Ethel “Feffie” Barnhill
2022 Bill Belichick
2023 Alfred "Alf" Jacques

Native American Scholarship Program[edit]

Since 2006, The Tewaaraton Foundation has given over $130,000 in scholarships to Native American high school lacrosse players through its Tewaaraton Native American Scholarships program.[9] The $10,000 scholarships are awarded annually on a highly competitive basis to one Native American female and one Native American male lacrosse player who are enrolled members of a U.S. tribe. All awards are not only based on the student's athletic performance, but also on their merit, academic achievement, and ambition.

Tewaaraton Native American Scholarship Recipients
Year Boys' Winner Nation Girls' Winner Nation
2006 Justin Gill Oglala Sioux and Seneca Nation of Indians Lindsey Steeprock Mohawk Nation
2007 Alexander Jamieson Seneca Nation of Indians, Wolf Clan Mia McKie Tuscarora Indian Nation, Turtle Clan
2008 Emmett Printup Tonawanda Seneca Corinne Abrams Tuscarora Indian Nation
2009 Isaac "Ike" Hopper Onondaga Nation Trenna Hill Mohawk Nation
2010 Kyle Henry Tuscarora Indian Nation, White Bear Clan Taylor Hummel Tuscarora Indian Nation, White Bear Clan
2011 Christopher White Oneida Nation Kristiana Ferguson Tuscarora Indian Nation
2012 Bradley Thomas Tuscarora Indian Nation Marissa Haring Seneca Nation of Indians
2013 Robert McMicking Cayuga Nation, Wolf Clan Cassandra Minerd Onondaga Nation, Eel Clan
2014 Kason Tarbell St. Regis Mohawk Tribe Alie Jimerson Cayuga Nation, Bear Clan
2015 Chaunce Hill Six Nations Seneca, Turtle Clan Lynnzee Miller Mohawk Nation, Wolf Clan
2016 Emerson Shenandoah Mohawk Nation, Snipe Clan Jade Haumann Seneca Nation of Indians, Wolf Clan
2017 Liam Anderson Tuscarora Indian Nation, Turtle Clan Shayla Scanlan Seneca Nation of Indians, Wolf Clan
2018 Lyle Warrior Seneca Nation of Indians Ivy Santana Seneca Nation, Wolf Clan
2019 Isaiah Cree Akwesasne Mohawk, Wolf Clan Jacelyn and Mirabella Lazore Akwesasne Mohawk, Wolf Clan
2020 Cobie Cree Mohawk Nation, Bear Clan Yanenowi Logan Seneca Nation, Deer Clan
2021 Peter Thais Mohawk Nation, Wolf Clan Fantasy Jimerson-Kenjockety Seneca Nation, Beaver Clan
2022 Crayton Cree Akwesasne Mohawk Nation, Bear Clan Savannah Swamp Akwesasne Mohawk Nation, Bear Clan

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Hinton, R., & Sutton, K. M. Lacrosse Injuries.
  2. ^ a b "The Trophy". The Tewaaraton Foundation.
  3. ^ a b c d e "Tewaaraton Award: History of the college lacrosse honor | NCAA.com". www.ncaa.com. Retrieved 2023-08-05.
  4. ^ "Selection Committees". The Tewaaraton Award. Retrieved 2023-08-05.
  5. ^ "The Greater Washington Sports Alliance Announces the 7th Annual Baltimore/Washington High School Watch List" (PDF). Tewaaraton. March 29, 2010. Retrieved August 5, 2023.
  6. ^ "Tewaaraton Award - University Club of Washington DC". www.universityclubdc.com. Retrieved 2023-08-05.
  7. ^ Men's Lacrosse: Player of the Year Watch Archived 2012-05-12 at the Wayback Machine
  8. ^ "Spirit of Tewaaraton". The Tewaaraton Award. Retrieved 2023-08-05.
  9. ^ "Native American Scholarships". The Tewaaraton Foundation.

External links[edit]