by By Dan Ninham (Oneida)
High achieving student-athletes lead busy lives from sun up to sun down usually seven days a week. Many indigenous cultures begin their day before the sunrise comes up on the horizon. They run toward the sunrise when the early morning is still dark. This is good medicine and indigenous runners believe they gain wisdom and strength, and become more focused and productive.
Early morning risers in the Salamanca area on the Seneca Alleghany Territory may be seeing a runner or runners doing this traditional practice in the near future.
Nizhoni Kennedy is a senior basketball star at Salamanca High School, Salamanca, New York. She is 5’8” and is versatile being a point guard, shooting guard, and a strong forward. Her hudl.com profile is located here: https://www.hudl.com/profile/13993360/Nizhoni-Kennedy
“The meaning behind the name Nizhoni is ‘beautiful’ in the Navajo language,” said Nizhoni. “I am the daughter of Karen Johns, Navajo/Ute Mountain Ute/White Mountain Apache and Adam Kennedy, a member of the Seneca Tribe. We live on the Seneca Allegany Territory in Western New York.”
“I am enrolled Navajo, first descendent Seneca, Ute Mountain Ute and White Mountain Apache,” said Nizhoni. “My clans are Tsénabahiłnii (Sleeping Rock People Clan), Ta’neeszahnii (Tangle Clan), and Nyagwai’ (Bear Clan).”
“I compete for my family and my own pursuit of happiness,” said Nizhoni. “On my father’s side, I come from a line of successful athletes that went to Salamanca. My aunts won the NYSPHSAA Class C State Championship in 1988. My father was named Big 30 Player of the Year, the league champion and MVP during his senior year. For my own accomplishments, my team won the league title and I was named this year’s league MVP for the CCAA East 2 Division.”
“In Navajo culture, we believe in self-belief and self-respect,” said Nizhoni. “I live my life through the philosophy of ‘Walk in Beauty.’ This defines me as an athlete because it keeps me positive and well grounded with my surroundings and the people I am around. My tribal core values taught me to respect myself, my teammates, my coaches, my fans, and my opponents.”
“My parents were my biggest motivators throughout my high school career,” said Nizhoni. “When things weren’t going right for me, they were always there for me and supporting me through everything. They constantly remind me that anything is achievable if you believe it and I could always count on them. They are amazing parents and I don’t know what to do without them. My confidence lives through them. I dedicated every game, every practice and every moment I have on the court for them.”
“Off the court, Nizhoni is a High Honor Roll student for the past two years,” said dad Adam Kennedy. “She is also a member of the National Honor Society and Key Club. She spends some weekends volunteering to help the community, ringing the bell for Salvation Army at Wal-Mart or community events. Nizhoni’s mother had a severe brain injury last summer and I happily say her mother is fighting for her life in a good way. Nizhoni spent many days visiting her mom and helping her little brother, while I traveled for work. Through all that she still was able to keep it together to help the grades, help her brother and become the best player in the area.”
“On the court, Nizhoni spent her first two years at another school and was a three guard,” said Adam. “When the point guard went down the coach asked her to step up and be the point guard. She helped a few players get their 1000 career points and unselfishly had to step back from her main scoring roll to keep the offense going. Her senior year she wanted to come back to the Salamanca Warriors and see if she could help the team out again knowing she would sacrifice winning and points with the move. She was greeted with open arms, the Warriors were on her regular season schedule and they typically got beat by her years before. She always had big games against them.”
“The Lady Warriors team won two games in 2019 season. The Lady Warriors are made up of girls’ lacrosse players. She turned them around to win the league and MVP and her coach is Coach of the Year. I could not be more proud of her and she has one of the sweetest jump shots you will ever see. I think everyone in Indian Country should hear about her for all she done and she won an academic scholarship from several colleges, and University of Buffalo and Syracuse are on her list. She wants to become a chemical engineer to make make-up,” added dad Adam.
“My coach Bryelle Wallin positively influences me,” said Nizhoni. “I officially met her about six months ago and she has honestly changed my life. I competed against her junior varsity team when she was still the varsity coach for Pine Valley and I was playing for Randolph. This past season was her second season as head coach for Salamanca and she became my coach when I transferred from Randolph. Through my emotional journey, she has always been there for me and she understands me. During my hard times she always pushed me forward and gave me that extra support I needed. She not only saw me as her player, but also the person I am behind an athlete. I truly appreciate everything she has done for me.”
Coach Bryelle Wallin said: “Nizhoni is a strong, resilient young lady. She is very passionate and determined, in everything that she does but she is especially passionate about basketball. When I learned that she was transferring to Salamanca, and wanted to play her senior year here, I was beyond excited. She was coming from a program that demands excellence, hard work and dedication, all things that I had been trying to instill in our program. Nizhoni lived up to the expectations and more. She led this year’s team through experience and example.
“This season, after only a few short weeks of knowing Nizhoni, her teammates overwhelmingly chose her as their number one choice for captain, earning her speaking captain privileges. They had the foresight and confidence, that she would be able to lead them. Her work ethic and desire to be her best, rubbed off on her teammates. Early in the season, Nizhoni had to miss a few games due to an ankle injury. Even though she was not able to practice or play, she showed up. She supported her team, giving advice and encouragement from the sidelines. Each practice, Nizhoni put in the work without question and on most days, stayed after practice to get in more reps. Every time she stayed, one or more of her teammates would stay,” added Coach Bryelle.
“In the past few years, Salamanca Lady Warriors basketball has been anything but successful,” said Coach Bryelle. “In trying to build a program, Nizhoni was just the player we needed, at the right time. She is someone that younger players look up to and her teammates respect. There is no doubt in my mind, that the reason we experienced the success that we did this season, is in part, due to Nizhoni’s presence. She made me a better coach and her teammates, better players. For that, I’m forever grateful.”
“One of the players I looked up to was Bronson Koenig, the former point guard of University of Wisconsin. He proved that anything is possible for all indigenous athletes as he holds UW’s record for most three-pointers in a game, season and career and became the first Native American athlete to play in an NCAA D1 National Championship game. He became very inspiring to me and my development for the game.”
“To keep up with my athletic shape during this pandemic, I have chosen to cut back on fattening food and stuck to eating a lot of fruits and vegetables,” said Nizhoni. “I try to work out about four times a week with the weights I have at home. I guess you can say I have a very generic workout routine with Russian twists, lunges, curl ups, sit ups, etc. I also like to add a 10 lb. medicine ball and/or basketball to my workouts. Some days, I like to shoot some hoops with my dad at the park.”
“My journey to becoming the CCAA East 2’s Champion and League MVP was certainly not an easy one,” said Nizhoni. “Last summer, I was still playing for Randolph in our summer league. I was entering my third varsity season with them and our team’s future was looking bright. On July 11th of 2019, I was supposed to play a game, but I felt ill that day and told Mr. Huntington, the Randolph coach, I couldn’t make it. I didn’t know that day was going to be the last day of my normal life. That night, my mom suffered a brain aneurysm that was misdiagnosed as an eye disease earlier that year, and it almost took her life. She was in ICU for two months and everyday was a constant battle with her fate. I honestly didn’t get sleep and couldn’t eat because I was constantly worried about her. I began to lose myself. That is when I made the decision to move back to where I started, Salamanca.”
“Moving back to Salamanca High School was very hard for me,” said Nizhoni. “I had to leave behind close friends that were like family to me, my teammates in Randolph, and the program I was loyal to for five years. I had to leave it all and it was like starting over again. My reasons for moving back to Salamanca were because all of my family lived there and to fulfill my mom’s wishes of being a Salamanca Warrior. If I needed help, my family was nearby. It took some time to adjust to everything, but to me, it was worth it. I was able to create and reconnect bonds there. Salamanca became my home and support system during my troubling times.”
“There was a point where my mind was contemplating whether or not should I play my senior year. I knew how much it was going to hurt, not seeing her pick me up after practices, being at my games, showing me the news articles she collected of me, and not seeing her at home. I just wanted to be by her side and hold her. I also knew she would never want me to stop playing and going on with my life because of her. This life-changing experience put a huge strain on my mental health. I relied a lot on my dad for comfort and guidance because he lost his mother to a brain aneurysm when he was in high school. He, unfortunately, understood what it feels like to try to live through a drastic change and continuing to do the things you love,” said Nizhoni.
“Heading into my senior season was very different compared to others,” said Nizhoni. “I’m grateful that I connected very quickly with my new coach and teammates and I started to view them as sisters like I have known them my entire life. We all knew this was going to be a tough season, but we all buckled down together as one. Last year before I came, they had a 2-19 record. This year, we improved to a 9-12 record, losing a couple of games by less than five points, named the CCAA East 2 League Champions, making it to JCC playoffs for the first time in five years and making a run at New York State’s fifth ranked team, Holland, ending their season with a 22-2 record.”
“In my final game against Holland, I was able to comprehend all of my accomplishments in high school basketball,” said Nizhoni. “Walking off that court for the last time was an enlightenment for me. Through my love and passion for the game, I am able to slowly regain who I was mentally. To be named this year’s League MVP, it truly means everything to me because I dedicated this whole season to my mom and the rest of my family. This season was not only my journey to becoming the league champion and player of the year, it also became my journey to find myself again,” added Nizhoni.
“My mom is doing better and she is improving every day,” said Nizhoni. “Like everyone that knows my mom, they all tell me she is a fighter and she’ll never give up. I still get very emotional when I talk about what happened to her and how it affected my family and me. I always think about my memories with her before all of this and it has taught me to never take anything for granted. I take it little by little everyday and always having faith in our Creator that things will get better.”
“The advice I tell young student-athletes that want to be successful is to just keep playing and never give up,” said Nizhoni. “I started to fall in love with basketball when I was in sixth grade, playing KYA ball with Navajo girls in Kirtland, New Mexico. I was a late starter and lacked the skills compared to the other girls, but I realized how much I enjoyed playing the game. I kept playing and playing, and my skills eventually started to evolve. That summer heading into seventh grade, I moved back to New York and started school at Randolph Junior/Senior High School.”
“I was planning on trying out for the modified seventh and eighth grade team, until Mr. Huntington, the varsity coach, came into one of the practices and pulled me up to try out for the junior varsity team. From the perspective of an athlete that just started playing basketball the year prior, this was a huge deal. During my seasons playing for the junior varsity team and being pulled up to varsity as a sophomore, I faced a lot of times of frustration and dissatisfaction in myself. There were times when I wanted to quit, just because I wasn’t grasping the concept of something or I had a really bad game,” added Nizhoni.
“The point of ‘keep playing and never giving up’ is that you’ll miss out on what you are truly capable of,” said Nizhoni. “From sixth grade, I never thought I would ever be named Player of the Year for basketball, but it happened because I never gave up. When my mom suffered her brain aneurysm, I almost gave up my senior year of basketball because I knew how difficult it was going to be for me to see her not in the crowd. If I didn’t play my final year, I wouldn’t be the CCAA East 2’s League MVP, I wouldn’t have made it to JCC to play against New York State’s fifth ranked team and I wouldn’t have experienced the incredible memories I made with this team.”
“Nizhoni is a wonderful student and athlete,” said Salamanca HS Athletic Director Richard Morton. “Nizhoni is a role model and a leader, and she is willing and eager to accept responsibility. She understands the importance of hard work and how it will affect others. Her punctuality for class, practices, and games are examples of her willingness to be a responsible young adult. In my opinion, Nizhoni shows promise in many areas. Due to her confidence and self-esteem, I feel Nizhoni will be a high achiever in any endeavor she pursues. Nizhoni is a self-disciplined, enthusiastic individual. She cares deeply about reaching her potential. She has motivated and led her peers as captain of her basketball team. As a student, Nizhoni relates very well to the teachers and staff, she is always courteous, polite and respectful.”
Laurie Lafferty-John, Salamanca HS Physical Education teacher said: “Nizoni has been an outstanding addition to our district. She had a quiet, yet determined, strength that all who are around her are affected by. She possesses confidence and focus and is comfortable with who she is. Her sweet smile and genuine spirit spreads positivity to her classmates and teammates. She doesn’t make excuses and she just sees the task at hand and gets the job done. One of the best kids we have in Salamanca.”
“All of the achievements I made this year all came from keep playing and never giving up,” said Nizhoni. “The upcoming generation must know to never stop playing and they must play on through their situations.”
Photo Credit: Michelle Hill
