![By Carolyn Coles (Flickr) [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons](https://web.studentportfolios.ca/~humberjournalism.com/humbernews/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2013/03/image.jpeg)
By Carolyn Coles (Flickr) [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons
By Christian Quequish
The Six Nations Minor Hockey Association is hosting its 42nd annual ‘Little Native Hockey League’ at the Hershey Centre in Mississauga from March 11 to March 14.
Six Nations minor hockey president Blaine Laforme told Humber News the tournament’s opening ceremony featuring CBC hockey commentator Don Cherry was held on Sunday.
“It was like Christmas to the kids,” Laforme said.
The opening ceremony included indigenous musical act, A Tribe Called Red as well as hoop dancer Lisa Odjig and Aboriginal musician Jace Martin, according to a press released from Woodland Cultural Centre in Brantford.
The tournament will host 155 teams from 42 First Nations communities, said Laforme.
He said the teams come from across the province and that it’s a time for everyone to come together.
“We have over 3,000 participants and about 10,000 guests in town.”
Humber College’s aboriginal resource centre will have a booth open during the tournament, Jonathon Araujo told Humber News.
The booth will be operated by Humber faculty and will promote the student athletics department as well as academic programs at Humber.
“So we’re setting up an informational booth at the week long tournament just providing information to the 3,000 athletes who are going to be involved in this tournament,” Araujo said.
He said it was part of a strategy to target student athletes in Grades 7 to 12 as prospective Humber College students.
“The age group ranges, it’s mostly teenagers that are going to be involved,” Araujo said, of the hockey tournament. “We have to let these youth know about the opportunities in post-secondary very early in their lives so they are aware of it and they can start planning for it.”