Let the Games begin

Sage Morin is a big guy. Like, hugely big. At almost seven feet tall, the Saskatoon native and college basketball player towers over most people, and is the tallest member of the King's University College Eagles team.

"It's kind of hard to find shoes," he said, sheepishly.

And sports have played an equally big role in this young aboriginal man's life.

"Growing up, my momma kept moving all the time, so I never actually had a hometown," he said. "I never had good, strong, set friends."

But basketball kept him on the straight and narrow.

"When I stepped onto the court, I'd be welcomed almost instantly."

He and his buds would travel from court to court in town, playing ball whenever they could.

"When I was playing basketball, I wasn't getting in trouble. When I was getting in trouble, I wasn't playing basketball."

Now 24, Morin is one of a host of volunteers coming to St. Albert this Sunday to share his love of sports with about 500 young aboriginal athletes as part of the city's first-ever Alberta Indigenous Games. As the game's basketball co-ordinator, he'll have to stage-manage scores of players from across the province as they compete for pride and prizes – and hopefully grow as people in the process.

"Everyone likes to do cool moves and everyone likes being better than whomever," he said, and doing that through sports can link kids to a strong community of fellow athletes. Sports takes your strong competitive nature and aims it at something positive, he said, instead of crime or greed on the street.

Game on

The Games are the brainchild of Beaumont's Allan Ross, who also co-founded the Edmonton Native Basketball Association. They're meant to teach kids healthy habits through sport and to give children from disadvantaged communities a chance to use top-flight facilities.

Ross ran the first games in 2011 after Canada pulled out of the 2010 North American Indigenous Games, leaving many athletes all trained up with no place to go. The 2011 games drew about 500 aboriginal athletes aged 12 to 18 to Edmonton, where they took part in six different events.

Organizers brought the Games to St. Albert this year due to the city's experience with the 55-Plus Games and Special Olympics, Ross said.

This year's games will feature four days of archery, ball hockey, basketball, canoeing, golf, lacrosse, track and volleyball, as well as live entertainment and a youth talent show. All events are free, and (with the exception of golf and canoeing) take place in St. Albert.

The games kick off with a sacred eagle-staff run Aug. 4 during the Poundmaker's Lodge powwow, Ross said. The eagle staff is a sacred symbol to aboriginals, he explained, and is equivalent to a national flag. The run is similar to the torch relay that starts the Olympics.

Starting at 10 a.m., 10 youths dressed in the blue, red, yellow and white of the medicine wheel will set out from Edmonton's Westmount Mall under police escort. Runners will alternate between carrying the staff itself and a large banner advertising the Games.

They will then run down St. Albert Trail, hang a right at 137 Avenue, a left at 142 Street, and then make a bee-line to the Poundmaker's Lodge arbour, arriving just in time for the grand-entry ceremony. The runners will then place the staff in the centre of arbour with the other staves and get ready for competition, which starts Monday.

It's taken well over a year to organize these games, Ross said, and there's still plenty more to do.

"We have to provide food for up to 1,400 individuals," he said, and find space for the hundreds of vendors and volunteers at the event. He's got 400 jackets and about a thousand T-shirts on order, as well as plenty of souvenirs and shiny medals, all on a shoestring budget.

"We're still working with basically pennies," he said.

Sports therapy

But Ross hopes those pennies will go a long way to help local athletes.

"A lot of our people are still smoking cigarettes," he said. "They're unhealthy and they don't exercise."

Many have low self-esteem and live in horrible conditions on reserves. All of these factors contribute to elevated dropout and incarceration rates, as well as greater risks of chronic diseases such as diabetes.

"Everything we're doing is to show (these youths) that they are valued and important, and that there is a better way," Ross said.

The games are built around the principles of the Circle of Courage, Ross said – a theory developed by Dr. Martin Brokenleg that shared values of belonging, mastery, independence and generosity must exist in a community if its members are to prosper.

Successful youths see their neighbours as kin, strive for personal growth (rather than dominance over others), seek independence (and respect the independence of others) and act unselfishly towards others, the theory goes. Nurture these values in youth, and you can steer them away from risky behaviours.

"Our games have infused these concepts into physical activity," Ross said.

Participants in the Games will each join a team named after one of the four values in the Circle of Courage, earning points as they compete. They can earn the most points by taking in free seminars offered at the Elder's Village on the circle's concepts. The team with the most points at the end gets free customized jackets.

Sports release endorphins that give you a natural high, said Gordon Bird, a volunteer co-ordinator for the Games and an active cyclist, as well as clarity and focus of mind.

"There's something magical that happens when you're performing a sport."

If you can succeed on the track, he continues, you can break down those mental barriers that keep you from succeeding elsewhere in life.

"(Sports) brought out the natural essence of who I am," he said. "I went from being a silent introvert to being an empowering extrovert."

Morin now serves as a volunteer basketball coach in remote First Nations communities.

"It's all about putting that foot in front of the kids for them to follow."

Many of these kids want to be involved in something, he noted, but don't have the resources to do so.

"Even a basketball would help."

Ross said he hopes that the players in this year's Games will leave the event with some unforgettable memories, "and that they have learned something that will be of substance and resonate with them for years to come."

The games run from Aug. 4 to 8. Full details can be found at aig2013.org.