Lacrosse to play first conference home game, tribe to bless field
Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe members will perform a ceremonial blessing of the field at 6 p.m. Friday at the Soccer/Lacrosse Complex before Central Michigan lacrosse plays Jacksonville.
The ceremony is a testament to the connection between the tribe and the university, said Head Coach Sara Tisdale.
“It furthers our relationship with the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe in a very positive direction,” she said. "All of our fans and family get to see such a great relationship that we don’t take lightly. We get to wear their name across our chests.”
The tribe's Interim Public Relations Director Erik Rodriguez said the tribal members will perform a traditional drum song and smudge the field before presenting a ceremonial lacrosse stick to Tisdale and team captains Riley Huda, Logan Halvorson and Jocelyn Lemay.
Native American smudging ceremonies are performed to dissipate negative past experiences, purify and influence positive beginnings.
“The great thing about this is our opponent will be out here with us too,” Tisdale said. “It’s a blessing for everyone instead of something just specific to our team, which I think is great for the community in general.”
The game will be the Chippewa’s third Atlantic Sun Conference matchup and fourth home game this season. The previous three home games took place during spring break.
The attendances for these games were 383, 414 and 133.
CMU won its first two games at home against Delaware State and Virginia Commonwealth. On Easter, the Chippewas lost to Robert Morris 19-4.
“I think our crowd will be bigger than usual,” Tisdale said. “This is a great weekend for athletics overall because of everything that’s going on. Hopefully we get a lot of students to come out. That would be excellent especially knowing how important this weekend is for us.”
The Chippewas returned from South Carolina last weekend with a win against Presbyterian, breaking a four-game losing streak Sunday with a 14-7 non-conference win.
Jacksonville (9-4, 4-0 A-Sun) has won three league championships since joining the A-Sun in 2013. The Dolphins have outscored their opponents by at least 10 goals in all four conference matchups they’ve played this season.
“They’re undefeated and a great team and it’s not by accident. They test themselves against the top 20 programs in the country.” Tisdale said.
The Chippewas are looking to improve their quality of time of possessions in their upcoming games. Tisdale said the team is preparing for Jacksonville with a similar strategy they used against Michigan earlier in the season — quality possessions.
"We don’t want to try and beat them in a leg race up and down the field," Tisdale said. "Especially since their bench is about 45 (players) deep. For us, it’s a matter of playing our game and making sure our time of possessions are long when we do have the ball.”
