Sequoyah High School Obituary Page

In Memoriam
Brandon Keith O'Field
Sequoyah HS ~ Student 1990s

     TAHLEQUAH, Ok -- Funeral services for Brandon Keith O'Field , were held Tuesday, October 18th, 2016 at Elm Tree Baptist Church with Pastor D.J. McCarter officiating and Brother Steve Campbell reading the eulogy. Interment followed at Grass Cemetery in Salina, Okla.

    Pallbearers for Brandon were: Darrel O'Field, Baron O'Field (Seq Class 2007), Matthew Dew, Anthony Kingfisher, and Christian Snow, David Horsechief. Honorary pallbearers were: Michael O'Field, Marcus O'Field, Connie Snow, Obadiah O'Field, and BJ O'Field.

    Brandon Keith O'Field was born on October 1st, 1972, the son of James and Bobbie (Gourd) O'Field in Claremore, OK. He grew up in a happy household with three brothers and one sister: Michael, Darrel, Marcus and Rhonda

    Brandon graduated from Sequoyah High School with the Class of 1990 and decided upon a career in law enforcement. He later attended Northeastern State University and graduated in December 2014.

    He married Lisa Pritchett on March 8,1997 and together they raised two sons and two daughters BJ, Obadiah, Mariah, and Brandilyn O'Field (Seq.Soph.2016). Brandon was a man of many talents and interests. Loved watching Sequoyah School play any kind of sports, he had his special front row seat where he could rally the team! (See story below) He coached little league baseball for his sons, played marbles, liked card games and OSU football!

He enjoyed a life spent serving his Lord and Savior. As an ordained minister, he helped others to find the God of kindness, compassion, and mercy he loved so dearly. He was a faithful member of Elm Tree Baptist and heard the angels sing every time his daughters sang at church, he often sang with them. He was happy, kind, considerate, and a wonderful person to be around. He could lift you up and make you see a brighter day then you started with. He thought he had the best family in the whole world, and every chance to gather with his family was special for Brandon.

    The Lord called this good and faithful servant home from the long road he trod on October 12th, 2016 in Tulsa, OK, with those he loved close by his side. He was 44 years old. He leaves the world a much better place because he was here.

He is preceded in death by his father James, and his beloved sister, Rhonda O'Field Snow.

    Those left to celebrate his memory include his loving wife Lisa of the home, his children, BJ O'Field and girlfriend Lizzy Guinnip of Tahlequah, Obadiah O'Field of Tahlequah, Mariah O'Field and boyfriend Taylor Osage of Tahlequah, and Brandilyn O'Field of Tahlequah. He leaves his mother, Bobbie O'Field of Tahlequah, brothers, Michael O'Field and wife Veronica, Darrell O'Field and Marcus O'Field all of Tahlequah, as well as many nieces, nephews, cousins and a host of friend and loved ones.

Pride of the People
Thousands are united behind Sequoyah
By Jenni Carlson ~ Daily Oklahoman ~ March 10, 2004

TAHLEQUAH - The line stretches for blocks, along the sidewalk and up the stairs.

And at the front stands Brandon O'Field. He is here at the Northeastern State gym for a high school playoff game. Here almost five hours before his team tips off. Here because he wants seats on the top row and knows he won't get them unless he arrived early.

O'Field loves his team's high-flying, hard-driving style and thinks it is going to defend its state championship. He drives all over northeastern Oklahoma to watch.

"We come to all the games," he says.

Him and thousands of other folks.

As good as this team is, though, the people come in droves for another reason. They are drawn by something they feel inside, some thing that brings them to Oklahoma City for the state tournament this week, something that transcends high school basketball.

The pride of a people has been stirred by the boys' basketball team at Tahlequah Sequoyah.

"Everybody that's Native American," Sequoyah coach Larry Grigg said, "this is their school."

And the Indians are their team.

It is a following born out of ethnicity, not geography. Sequoyah is a boarding school for Native Americans. Funded by the Bureau of Indian Affairs and operated by the Cherokee Nation, the school is open to Indians from any tribe or state. Even though many current students come from Cherokee County or adjacent Adair County most of whom choose to live at home instead of the dorms there are 42 tribes and 14 states represented.

Sequoyah's team and its fans are coming to State Fair Arena on Thursday. The Indians open against Riverside, another Native American boarding school with its own sizable following.

Good thing it's the Big House.

Despite such a far-flung student body, Sequoyah's crowds are the envy of any high school. They have become so large that the Indians played only three of their nine regular-season home games at home. The school's gym seats only 600, so games have been farmed out to the Civic Center in Muskogee and to Northeastern State across town in Tahlequah.

"It is the hottest ticket in town," said Jeremy Marshall, the point guard on Sequoyah's '98 team, "the hottest ticket on this side of the state." For Sequoyah, playing at the Big House used to be a far-fetched notion.

From 1970-85, the Indians had only three winning seasons. The late '80s saw improvement when Sequoyah strung together four winning seasons under Gerald Fishinghawk, but the real change came a decade later under Leroy Qualls.

"They called us the Native American Dream Team," Marshall said.

In 1997, the Indians made a serious bid for state, winning 20 games and advancing to the area tournament. Their season ended with a one-point, overtime loss to Tulsa Victory Christian.

Word spread about Sequoyah, and when the Indians opened their season the next fall, their following had exploded.

That was Grigg's first year at Sequoyah. Hired as the school's girls basketball coach, he stood on the court watching people pour in for the season opener. A few minutes before tip-off, his son, Tucson, breathlessly ran up to him.

"Dad," he said, "they aren't going to let mom in."

Unaware of the large crowds, Grigg's wife, Tommie, thought she had arrived in plenty of time to see the girls' game. She instead found herself near the back of the line with school officials threatening to shut the doors and limit the crowd.

"She had to sneak in a back door," Grigg said.

The crowds only got bigger.

So did the team's visibility. Buttons were made, and T-shirts were sold.

"It was like rock-star status," Marshall said.

It wasn't just the team's success that drew fans, though. The Indians played an up-tempo game that is still their hallmark today.

"That's what people like to see," Marshall said.

When the Indians made state for the first time in 1998, they played their opener at the University of Central Oklahoma instead of State Fair Arena.

"I wasn't sure the gym they had would hold us," Sequoyah principal Gina Stanley said. "It was unbelievable."

A phenomenon was born.

Now it is a full-grown craze, a winter-month happening every time Sequoyah packs up the show and moves across town to Northeastern State.

John Dreyer stood in the middle of the mayhem doing the math out loud.

"Two is six. Two is eight," he said. "Six and eight is 14."

Money and tickets exchanged hands, and he'd move on to the next one.

"How many?"

Dreyer, an assistant coach for both the boys and girls basketball teams, stayed and sold tickets for almost an hour. The doors never shut, held open by a continuous stream of fans.

"It's like going to a college game," Sequoyah center Wes Nofire said. "Colleges around here, like Division II, they never get as many fans as what we get showing up at our games."

Winning a state championship last season only intensified the crush.

Sequoyah blew through the Class 3A playoffs, winning its last seven games by double figures and knocking off the top three teams one by one at the state tournament. First, No. 3 Alva. Then, No. 2 Millwood in the semifinals. Then, No. 1 Metro Christian in the finals.

Now every game is an event.

Playing in the Tournament of Champions at Oral Roberts earlier this season, Sequoyah played Tulsa Union in the semifinals. Union, which is less than 10 minutes from the Mabee Center, was then ranked No. 1 in Class 6A.

"It was probably the most intense game I've ever played in," Nofire said.

Fellow senior Derrick Stanley said, "ORU probably doesn't draw as many people as that."

The final score: Sequoyah 66, Union 64 in overtime.

The team that arrives in Oklahoma City on Thursday has never seen success like this. The school has not been void of athletic championships. Long a powerhouse in cross country, the boys team won the school's sixth state title last fall.

"But it's not in the public eye like basketball is," Grigg said. "That's the big deal."

Basketball is more mainstream, not only in American society but also in Native American culture. Indian children grow up playing basketball. They might never have worn a football helmet or swung a baseball bat, but they know how to shoot a jumper and cross-over dribble.

"It's Indian ball," Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chad Smith said.

And it's all the rage in the northeast corner of the state. Folks fly Sequoyah car flags, wear Indians shirts and even use their lunch breaks on game days to go to the arena and save seats with masking tape.

"I'm going to look back probably 20 years from now and say, 'Man, I don't know how I could do that in front of all those people,'" guard Jeff Elizondo said. "It's an amazing crowd."

It's a crowd that will flood State Fair Arena this weekend, a crowd celebrating more than the basketball team's success at Sequoyah.

Opened in 1871 for Indian children orphaned by the Civil War, Sequoyah faced closure in the mid-1980s.

The school had become a dumping ground, a last resort for many Native American students. Unable to stay in public schools, many students went to Sequoyah. With no requirement for admission other than proof of tribal membership or being one-fourth blood descendants, the school had to take them.

"They were just running our good students off," said Don Crittenden, who's been on the Sequoyah school board for three decades.

Enrollment dipped to 60 students.

"There wasn't anything for the government to do but to close us," Crittenden said.

Crittenden and others went to Washington, D.C., to ask the Bureau of Indian Affairs for one more year. One last chance to make good out of what had become a bad situation. The BIA turned over operation of the school to the Cherokee Nation.

The tribe infused the school with money, providing funding for upgraded materials and improved teachers. There's been no talk of closing the school since.

Reversing decades of decline, though, didn't happen overnight.

When Gina Stanley joined Sequoyah's administration 12 years ago, students hung out in the halls instead of going to class, and no one prodded them to go. Graffiti covered the walls. Sweeps by drug dogs routinely yielded contraband.

"I wanted this to be a school I wanted to send my kids to," Stanley said.

Now it is. Her son, Derrick, is a senior at Sequoyah.

Students don't loiter in the halls. The facilities are clean, the attitudes positive, the shoulders back, the heads high. And those random drug sweeps?

"It was interesting after a couple of years to hear ... 'I can't believe this is the same school,'" Stanley said.

In the past decade, minimum standards were added to the admissions process. Applicants must have a grade point average of 2.0 and three letters of recommendation.

Standards have been raised.

"It builds a level of pride," Sequoyah superintendent Tony Pivec said. "That's translating into all areas."

ACT scores are up. So is concurrent enrollment in college courses and graduates pursuing post-secondary education.

Excellence is expected, and that goes for basketball, too.

"Everybody expects us to (win state)," Nofire said. "I really want to do it.

"You not only do it for yourself. You do it for your fans."

Sequoyah, no longer a down-and-out school, no more a doormat team, returns to state this week to defend its title.

Its fans will return, too.

Hotel rooms have been reserved for weeks in anticipation of the trip to Oklahoma City. There will be family and friends, but there will also be folks who graduated from Sequoyah and others who have no direct tie but feel a connection with the team.

Folks like O'Field. A 1990 graduate of Sequoyah, he will be at State Fair Arena on Thursday when Sequoyah opens against Riverside. He knows the stands will be packed. He knows the only way secure the seats he wants is to be first in line.

"We did it last year," O'Field said. "We got there early."

Take it from someone who knows.

It promises to be quite a show.