By Rich Winter

605 Sports

SPEARFISH — Prior to Thursday’s quarterfinal game against Wagner, Mahpiya Luta senior Essence Tobacco was feeling some nerves. Tobacco suffered an ankle injury during the regular season and Thursday’s action was the first time she’d seen game action in several weeks. 

The normally confident player didn’t feel like playing and told herself she couldn’t until she looked up towards her family and saw what she thought was her dad.

“I looked up in the stands for my auntie and I saw a guy that looked like my dad,” Tobacco said. 

Tobacco lost both of her parents, Sylvester Tobacco and Angie Red Cloud, by the time she was five years old. She doesn’t remember her mother very much but she knows that her dad had a great love of horses so seeing someone that looked like him in the stands gave her heart an emotional lift. 

“That made me really happy,” Tobacco said. “My heart was telling me it was my dad watching over me and it made me want to play as well as I could.” 

Mary Tobacco, Essence’s aunt, has raised her niece as her daughter since losing both of her parents and remembers the moment her sister-in-law asked her if she would raise her daughter as one of her final requests.

“I thought of it as a huge sense of responsibility and I was sitting on the bed with Angie when Essence came in with a big smile,” Mary Tobacco said. “She was well loved by her parents and I knew that this was probably the last time she was going to see her mom. It was sadness and a big huge commitment and a lot of gratitude that her mother entrusted me with someone that was so important to her.” 

Mary Tobacco has no biological children of her own and was the youngest of her brothers and sisters. All of Tobacco’s siblings had children and Mary Tobacco loved spending time with her nieces and nephews. 

Angie Red Cloud was 37 years old when she passed away after an undisclosed illness. In her heart of hearts, Mary Tobacco thinks her sister-in-law knew her daughter would thrive. 

“She knew that I would help Essence have structure and basketball in her life,” she said. 

After a standout career at Mahpiya Luta, Mary Tobacco attended Huron College where she played basketball for four years.

After returning home after college, Mary Tobacco began coaching at Mahpiya Luta. She was the head coach at Mahpiya Luta for five seasons and Little Wound High School for two seasons. Twice she was named the Lakota Nation Invitational Outstanding Coach and her 2003 Mahpiya Luta squad won the Lakota Nation Invitational championship. Tobacco coached in two state tournaments with the Crusaders and her 2006 Little Wound team won the Dakota Oyate Challenge. 

Tobacco is well known for her coaching the women’s basketball team at Oglala Lakota College and has coached numerous elementary and middle-school teams and is currently coaching her grandson’s fifth grade team.

When she first brought Essence home she remembers a girl that was hurting. 

“When Essence would cry or be sad I just had to tell her that her mom was an angel and that she was with her,” Mary Tobacco said. “She had been very adventurous and just like to be a wild spirit. She got really quiet and she kinda toned down and then after a while she decided to blossom.” 

And she started to play basketball.

While Mary Tobacco was coaching at the college, Essence Tobacco tagged along.

“She was always an inspiration to me growing up and taught me everything I know,” Essence Tobacco said. “She would put me in the gym and make me work out while she was coaching the college girls.” 

Mary Tobacco remembers a girl that fell in love with the game at an early age.

“We live three miles north of Mahpiya Luta and have a dirt hoop but we spent a lot of time at the Mahpiya Luta gym because it is always open in the summer,” she said. “She would come to the college practices with me and I had her do dribble drive stuff and that’s where her good footwork started.” 

As Essence’s guardian, Mary Tobacco encouraged her daughter to take a summer away from basketball several years ago for health and mental health purposes. Essence Tobacco spent a summer around horses reconnecting with something that had given her father so much joy. 

“I think it’s important for athletes to take some time off and refocus,” Mary Tobacco said.
Essence Tobacco is 5-feet-3 but plays much bigger. She is a defensive force for Mahpiya Luta and is capable of hitting jump shots and 3-pointers when called upon. 

“I just love her basketball IQ,” Mary Tobacco said. “She loves her role and plays defense and then comes in and hits three pointers once in a while.” 

In each of the first two games at the Donald E. Young Center in Spearfish, a row for family members, affectionately nicknamed Tobacco Row, has been cleared for the family to sit together. 

Tobacco Row is expected to be full on Saturday as Mahpiya Luta meets Sioux Falls Christian. 

“I think her parents would be so pleased and amazed that she has some of their skills and a lot of their strengths and surprised at her courage,” Mary Tobacco said. “I can see her mom and dad smiling. She has all these siblings that look up to her and now her number, No. 20 is the new family number.” 

Essence Tobacco has a deep love for the woman that helped her blossom into a young person that will continue her academic and athletic career next season at United Tribes Technical College. 

“I love her a lot,” she said. “She’s pushed me to be my best and has always supported me through everything. I just appreciate her and she is my mother.”