The AFLW Indigenous-themed rounds touch the heart of every player connected to the more than 250 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mobs across the nation, but none more so this season than second-year Hawthorn star Mattea Breed.

The proud Tiwi woman is calling the annual fixture across two home and away weekends of the tailend of this AFLW season a "very special round", while also paying tribute to the contribution of her mum Rosanna De Santis to female players, both on and off the field.

Breed might be a powerful midfielder in the centre for the Hawks, but the Territorian can be soft-centred away from all the hard tackles and driving bursts.

"To have someone, who is just so heavily in your corner to support you in like every element is," she said of her mother on afl.com.au before pausing, "well, makes me feel a little bit teary".

Breed also refers to her mum as a personal "hero", a woman who was one of the pioneers of the female game in the Top End.

De Santis, a familiar face at St Mary's first and Darwin Buffettes later, remarkably played the game well past 50 years of age before being appointed AFL Northern Territory community football manager in 2018.

But for her 23-year-old daughter, De Santis is also a hero for the way she reached out to their Tiwi family and rebuilt lost connections.

"My grandmother was a part of the Stolen Generation that was raised in a Catholic mission," Breed said.

"She was also not taught any of her culture or traditions."

Breed was born in Darwin on Larrakia land, the daughter of two police officers, and later she spent significant time on the Tiwi Islands to reconnect with culture.

It has been an experience that Breed treasures as she moves through the next phase of her life into the transition of living in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne.

"Our Indigenous culture is passed down so heavily through oral history and traditions," she said.

"That's why mum made such a mission to learn as much as she could and pass that down, even though that wasn't organic."

That love of culture included her own growth on the Tiwi footy fields. Every weekend across Bathurst and Melville islands 900 of the 2500 residents are playing football - including seven local women's teams.

It also had Breed thinking of the barriers to identifying female talent and finding a way for them to reach the very top.

"When you see that sort of talent, you just think if there was just somebody to support you to help you to the next level, the possibilities are endless," she said.

The Tiwi following was there for Breed when the family was present in Cairns to cheer her on against Naarm in a six-point win in the first half of Indigenous round.

To make the trip even more worth the family's while, Breed took a genuine mark-of-the-year contender that shocked even herself. Replays caught the player walking back to kick towards the Hawks' goals with a look of disbelief on her face.

Suitably, Breed was days earlier picked by the club to model the Hawks' Indigenous guernsey. The design tells the story of Hawthorn's AFLW journey and its three First Nations' players.

While Indigenous teammates Kaitlyn Ashmore and Janet Baird played for North Melbourne and Gold Coast initially before joining Hawthorn, Breed was honoured to be the club's official first Indigenous player.

The trio's presence was incorporated into the design of the three circles on their guernsey that represent the three foundational pillars of people, football and sustainability.

The back of the guernsey displays the rain that nurtures the seeds of development and growth, in addition to people of the club coming together in celebration of football and resilience, surrounded by its community and football supporters, according to the Hawks' website.

Breed's recruitment to Waverley was quite a process.

"It wasn't a very streamline process," she said.

Darwin Buffettes for the juniors, Southern Districts in the seniors in the Top End, then SANFL clubs North Adelaide and Norwood for a year each, a switch to a club in the amateur Adelaide Football League followed, before playing briefly back at North Adelaide for one last crack at the AFLW ranks.

The Crows showed modest interest to drafting Breed before the Hawks unexpectedly swooped a couple of years later.

"Yeah, I played four games at North Adelaide, then I had a chat with Hawthorn and obviously they had seen enough of me in the past and saw a bit of my potential in that current season and they decided to bring me across and that was very exciting," she said.

"I didn't think the odds were very high (of getting drafted), so I was really shocked when it did happen, but I am really thankful to them because that was a great opportunity."