Pacific Northwest Native Lacrosse

Fort Michilimackinac.

On June 2, 1763, Ojibwe and Sauk gathered outside these walls to play baaga’adowewin - lacrosse.

The British came out to watch, leaving the gates open and their weapons behind.

As the game moved toward the fort, Native women waited near the gates wrapped in heavy blankets, concealing weapons beneath them.

Then the ball came down near the open gate.

The players rushed for it. The women opened their blankets and handed them the weapons.

Within minutes, the British garrison was overwhelmed and the Ojibwe took control of Michilimackinac.

That’s why I wanted to stand here.

There was something powerful about standing outside these same walls 263 years later with CREATOR’S GAME across my chest.

Long before modern lacrosse, the traditional stick and ball games were Ceremony. Medicine. Community. Joy. And in this case, Resistance.

This place and this story are an important, often forgotten piece of Native history and the history of this game. These stories of traditional games as resistance matter.

And if we are going to carry this game forward, we have a responsibility to remember the people, the places and the stories that carried it here.

Respect the roots, and let’s carry the game forward in a good way. 🥍

A few months ago, our vision became clearer.

For years, our focus was “More Native Youth Playing Lacrosse.” We wanted to see more Native kids on fields, more representation, and more belonging in the modern game.

That mission hasn’t changed, but our purpose has become even clearer.

Today, our focus is “Culture through Creator’s Game.”

We want to create opportunities for Native youth to deepen their connection to who they are through the game.

Seeing one of our campers at Creator’s Game Culture Camp standing in front of Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center holding both his drum and his lacrosse stick feels like a powerful expression of that vision.

In sports, it’s easy to become consumed by wins, rankings, scholarships, and what’s next.

We believe this game can offer something even greater.

In partnership with Creator, we hope to use lacrosse to help raise strong, proud, grounded Native people who know who they are, where they come from, and who carry that identity with them throughout their lives.

Because in the end, our greatest success won’t be measured by championships. It will be measured by the people our youth become.

Our future deserves nothing less.

Native High School Players, We Want You!

Registration is now open for our next two PNW NATIVE LACROSSE All Native High School Teams, and we’re looking for Native players to join us this fall and winter!

🥍 High School Girls
Sagebrush Winter Warm-Up
📍 Tri-Cities, WA
📅 October 24–25

🥍 High School Boys (Classes of 2029 & 2030)
Space Needle Shootout
📍 Tukwila, WA
📅 December 4–6

These tournaments are about more than competing. They’re an opportunity to represent your Tribe, your family, and your community through the Creator’s Game while building friendships with Native players from across the region.

✅ No team fees
✅ Uniforms provided (yours to keep)
✅ Tournament registration covered by PNW Native Lax
✅Families are only responsible for travel, lodging, and meals.

We’re also planning team camps before each tournament to help players build chemistry and spend time together before competition.

Registration closes September 1.

If you’re a Native high school player interested in joining us, sign up at the link in our bio.

Know someone who should be playing with us? Share this post and help us spread the word.

More Native Youth Playing Lacrosse. 🧡🥍

This photo was taken during the Opening Ceremony at The Gathering in Whitefish, Montana, where we had the honor of leading the pregame reflection before hundreds of players, coaches, and families took the field.

One of the things I believe most deeply is that the future of lacrosse depends on all of us having a better relationship with the Indigenous origins of this game.

Before games, we share some of the teachings that have been carried for generations. We talk about the first game between the Four-Legged and the Winged, and how it reminds us that lacrosse is for everybody. We talk about the Medicine Game and how lacrosse has always been about healing people and communities. We talk about how Creator enjoys watching His people play, giving us permission to play with joy because that joy is reciprocal to Creator. And we remember that this game has long been used to strengthen relationships and resolve conflict without violence.

These teachings change how you see the game.

The traditional wooden stick is not just a piece of history. It is alive. It carries stories, teachings, responsibilities, and a spiritual connection that still has something to teach every one of us today.

When more of the lacrosse community understands where this game comes from and why it was given, the game grows in a good way. We honor its origins while helping build a future that is rooted in respect.

This photo captures one of the tournament players spending a moment with a traditional stick handcrafted by Johnson Lacrosse before taking the field.

Lacrosse has always been more than a sport. It is medicine.

🥍 Native Girls Play Lacrosse 🥍

The Haudenosaunee Nationals just completed a historic run at the 2026 World Lacrosse Women’s Championship in Tokyo, representing their people, their Nation, and the game at the highest level.

Every time the Haudenosaunee step onto an international field, they do something no other team in our sport can do. They travel on their own Haudenosaunee passports, exercising their sovereignty on the world stage and reminding the world that they are not just participating in international competition, they are representing their own Nation.

Before they left for Japan, we had the honor of gifting them these Native Girls Play Lacrosse shirts. To receive this photo back means more than we can put into words.

It tells every Native girl who has ever wondered if she belongs that the answer is yes.

It tells every young Indigenous player that the highest levels of this game are not beyond her.

These women carry far more than sticks. They carry generations of resilience, culture, responsibility, and pride. They remind the world that the game gifted by Creator to the Haudenosaunee is still being carried forward by Indigenous women with strength, excellence, and joy.

To the Haudenosaunee Nationals women, thank you for showing our girls what is possible.

We couldn’t be more proud to see you carrying this message across the world. 💜🥍💛🥍

Nearly 300 relatives gathered together in Montana this weekend for something much bigger than dinner.

Together, we filled an entire ballroom with laughter, drumming, songs, stories, gift giving, and community. Youth, parents, coaches, Elders, and supporters from dozens of Tribal Nations came together because of the Creator’s Game.

It was the first time we have ever attempted something like this, and standing in that room reminded us that what we are building is about far more than lacrosse. It is about creating spaces where Native families can gather, celebrate who we are, and strengthen the relationships that have always sustained our communities.

A heartfelt thank you to Mariah Gladstone and Indigikitchen for preparing an incredible meal of braised bison and wild rice bowls, nourishing nearly 300 people with Indigenous foods rooted in culture, land, and tradition.

To everyone who attended, volunteered, donated, sang, drummed, shared a story, offered a gift, helped set up, cleaned up, or simply showed up with an open heart, thank you. This evening belonged to all of us.

We won’t soon forget what it felt like to look around that room and see hundreds of our relatives gathered together through the Creator’s Game.

This is what Culture Through Creator’s Game looks like.

🧡🥍

Last weekend, I received one of the most meaningful gifts of my life.

Memphis and Canyon Sundown gifted me a traditional Haudenosaunee lacrosse ball, handcrafted by a Haudenosaunee Title Holder.

To many people it may look like a simple lacrosse ball.

To me, it is Medicine.

This morning, while smudging with my stick and this ball beside me, I was reminded just how simple the Creator’s Game really is.

A stick. A ball. A gift from Creator.

Given to bring healing to the people.

Sometimes I think we overcomplicate it. Before the equipment, the leagues, the tournaments, and everything else, this game has always been about relationship. Relationship with Creator, with one another, and with ourselves.

I am deeply grateful to Memphis Sundown , Canyon, and Meg Logan for this incredibly meaningful gift.

Thank you for trusting me to help honor and teach the game that your people have carried for generations. It is a responsibility I will never take for granted.

Nya:wëh. 🥍

Cooper embodies Culture through Creator’s Game.

We first met Cooper (Puyallup) a year and half ago at our first pro clinic with JaKe PiSeNo and since then Cooper has become a lacrosse player and a dancer proudly representing who he is as a Native youth.

Cooper is kind, funny, and absolutely fearless and is who we hope we can be when we grow up.

Cooper offered our culture dinner of almost 300 people his gift of dancing and it’s safe to say it took our breath away. To honor Cooper, we gifted him his first wooden lacrosse stick that he played with the very next day.

Endlessly proud of you Coop!

Swipe through to see Cooper dancing!

We made history this past weekend.

For the first time ever, PNW NATIVE LACROSSE fielded an All-Native high school girls team.

17 girls. 16 Tribal Nations. Relatives from across Turtle Island coming together to play Creator’s Game.

And what made this weekend so special wasn’t just that they took the field together. It was watching them become a team.

They competed, laughed, built friendships and supported one another while representing their families, Tribes and communities with pride. Many of these girls arrived as strangers and left connected through Creator’s Game, and it was truly special to witness in person.

A huge thank you to our coaches Olivia Bean Johnston and lux ☀️ for the way they led, supported and showed up for these girls. We couldn’t have asked for a better duo to help us make history.

We are incredibly proud of every one of these young women and the statement they made simply by stepping onto that field together:

Native Girls Play Lacrosse.

📸 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 12 : K. F. O.

This past weekend, we brought together more than 100 Native lacrosse players in Montana to represent the Creator’s Game.

Seven teams. Boys and girls. Second graders through seniors in high school. Native youth and families from across Turtle Island, coming together through a game that has connected our people for generations.

When we first dreamed of PNW NATIVE LACROSSE, we never could have imagined that in less than three full years, this would be possible.

More than 100 Native kids playing together on an All-Native lacrosse club.

Nearly 300 Native youth, families, coaches and community members gathering around a meal prepared by an Indigenous chef.

Culture sharing. Gift giving. New friendships. Old relatives reconnecting. Kids meeting other Native kids from communities hundreds and thousands of miles away and taking the field together.

But what we are constantly reminded of is that this was never about the limits of our imagination.

It is about Creator’s.

Our job is to listen, to respond, to keep showing up and to steward whatever Creator puts in front of us.

And it is safe to say Creator went off this weekend.

There were moments when we looked around the fields and almost couldn’t believe what we were seeing. Native kids everywhere. Native coaches on the sidelines. Families gathering under tents. Our cultures being shared openly and proudly. Our young people playing a game given by Creator to our relatives and carrying it forward in their own way.

That is bigger than lacrosse.

Swipe through for just a few moments from a weekend we will never forget. There is so much more to share.

We are humbled. We are endlessly grateful. And we are incredibly proud of every player, coach, parent, family member and relative who came together to make this possible.

More Native youth playing lacrosse. More Native youth knowing this game belongs to them. More Native youth playing for Creator.

This is the Creator’s Game. 🥍