Seeking Indian sports refs

SD group recruiting American Indians as referees

By Wayne OrtmanAn effort to recruit American Indians as high school basketball referees drew more than a dozen prospects on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in southwest South Dakota and will expand to football and volleyball officiating.

The reservation, which covers much of an area from Highway 83 west to the Wyoming border and from Interstate 90 south to Nebraska, did not have any basketball or football officials until last year, said Wayne Carney, executive director of the South Dakota High School Activities Association.

Then Mary Tobacco, a former high school coach at Red Cloud and Little Wound on the reservation, recruited 16 men and women to become basketball officials. Two moved away before their training was complete, but 14 finished, Tobacco said.

Gov. Mike Rounds' office provided $15,000 for that effort and has committed $20,000 this coming school year to find and train football and volleyball officials on the reservation.Comment:  For more on the subject, see Indians Love Rez Ball and The Unofficial Sport of Indian Country.