Fans cheer after the Red Lake girls basketball team scores during a game against Cromwell-Wright in the Class A state basketball tournament on March 16, 2017, at Mariucci Arena in Minneapolis. (Jillian Gandsey | Bemidji Pioneer)

Editor's note: In the Ojibwe communities of northern Minnesota, basketball is huge. As the popularity of the game continues to grow, basketball presents an increasing number of opportunities for young athletes and the communities they represent. The following is the first of a three-part series detailing how basketball has provided a path to higher education for Ojibwe peoples in the region.

Arnold Kingbird grew up in the Mission Area, a relatively secluded community 10 miles north of Cass Lake on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation. Like other young boys in the area, he developed a love for basketball on the road in front of his home, where he and his cousins chased loose balls into the trees of the Chippewa National Forest. Back then, Arnold was a little guy with a long braid who followed the local Cass Lake-Bena Panthers boys basketball team to Minneapolis for four consecutive state tournament appearances. On that hoop, in front of his home, he imagined himself, as he practiced, playing for the Panthers at the state tournament under the big lights of Williams Arena and Target Center.

Those dreams came to fruition this past winter when Kingbird and his teammates led Cass Lake-Bena back to the Minnesota state basketball tournament after a seven-year absence. Kingbird and fellow senior Noah Delapaz, both 1,000-point scorers, were two pieces of a Panther attack that featured an uptempo game with hot shooting and tenacious defense. The Panthers opened up the tournament with a thrilling overtime win over Rushford-Peterson before dropping their next two games and finishing fourth.

Cass Lake-Bena senior Arnold Kingbird (22) passes the ball to the inside in a Class A semifinal game against North Woods High School at the state tournament on March 23, 2018, at the Target Center in Minneapolis. (Jillian Gandsey | Bemidji Pioneer)

Delapaz, who was selected to the all-tournament team, said, "It was a dream come true. It was something that we had been working towards since fourth or fifth grade."

Cass Lake-Bena was not the only team at the state tournament representing northern Minnesota's Ojibwe country. Of the Class A field, four teams had strong representation from Ojibwe communities. In addition to Cass Lake-Bena on the Leech Lake Reservation, this year's state tournament also saw Hinckley-Finlayson, with five players from the Lake Lena and Hinckley communities on the Mille Lacs Reservation; Mahnomen-Waubun, with several players from the White Earth Reservation; and North Woods, with seven players from the Bois Forte Reservation, including Cade Goggleye and Trevor Morrison from the community of Nett Lake, who were both selected to this year's all-tournament team.

Cade Goggleye, who reached the 1,000-point plateau this year as a junior, will have his sights set on leading the Grizzlies to a state championship, after finishing as runner-up in both 2017 and 2018. He has made a name for himself through his exemplary play during the past two state tournaments, not only in Indian Country, but across the state.

Two Ojibwe teams that were missing from this year's state tournament were the Ogichida (Warriors) of Fond du Lac Ojibwe School in Cloquet, who made the state tournament in 2014 and 2015, and the Ogichidaag, or Warriors, of Red Lake High School on the Red Lake Nation, who have made nine appearances at the state tournament in the past 22 years.

Part two of the Pioneer's three-part series will take a look at the basketball traditions ingrained within the communities of Red Lake and Cass Lake-Bena.

Patrick Haugen is a graduate of Bemidji High School and has been a special education teacher at Cass Lake-Bena for 22 years.