Taylor Cummings is a three-time Tewaaraton winner, a member of Team USA and the head coach at McDonogh (Md.) . "Taylor's Takes" is presented by Gait Lacrosse. Be legendary.
We’ve hit the time of the season when all eyes go to three things — conference tournaments, the NCAA tournament and the Tewaaraton Award.
Last week, I mentioned that conference tournaments were going to be more exciting than ever, and now that we have the official brackets for several conferences, that’s a guarantee. After this upcoming final week of conference play, we will also have a better idea of the NCAA tournament picture — which we will discuss thoroughly.
With all that being said, we now have one topic remaining to cover — the Tewaaraton. The foundation just announced its 25 nominees for player of the year, so what better time to do a round one, top-five selection than now?
For those who do not know, the Tewaaraton Award is given at the end of the each season to the best male and female lacrosse players and is thought of as the Heisman Trophy of lacrosse. As the Tewaaraton Foundation’s website explains, “Lacrosse is one of the oldest team sports played in North America. Rooted in centuries of Native American tradition, the game took on many variations before reaching its present day form. ‘Tewaaraton’ is the Mohawk name for their game and the progenitor of present day lacrosse.”
To learn more about the history of the game of lacrosse and the Tewaaraton Foundation, please visit https://tewaaraton.com.
Although this award is an individual one, most (if not all) of the recipients view the Tewaaraton as a team award because without their teams, they wouldn’t even be on that stage to be considered — let alone win. While we still have much more lacrosse to play (yay!) and players across the country will continue to impress, these are my picks for the Tewaaraton top five if the ceremony was next weekend.
Taylor’s Tewaaraton Top Five
Izzy Scane, Northwestern
The Scane Train hype is real and for good reason. Izzy Scane is a force to be reckoned with this year for the Wildcats. She’s an incredible athlete with a powerful shot, but what sets her apart is her vision and composure.
Scane is never frantic, even in double- and triple-teams, and she constantly keeps her head up to hit teammates with spot-on feeds. Northwestern has been cruising through the Big Ten with ease, and she is an integral reason why. Scane has 70 goals, 18 assists, and a shooting percentage of 52.5 through 11 regular season games.
Charlotte North, Boston College
When you watch a BC game, it doesn’t take much to notice Charlotte North. She has dazzled the lacrosse world all season long with her creative play, overwhelming passion for the game and sniper-like shooting capabilities.
Under the eye of assistant coach Kayla Treanor, North has become one of the deadliest attackers in the game who can expose defenses in a multitude of ways. She can dodge, she can feed, she can cut and she can rip it from anywhere at any time. North has 62 goals, nine assists and 123 draw controls through the regular season.