Written by Tiffany Jones
It was her junior year in high school. Sierra Rollins was finally coming off the bench after tearing her ACL in a previous game.
Little did she know, that game would change her career because sitting in the bleachers was Harding women’s basketball coach Tim Kirby.
“I guess that tearing my ACL brought me to Harding in a sense,” Rollins said, recalling that night.
Basketball was one of the main reasons Rollins decided to come to Harding, but she said having some friends who were also coming to Harding helped her make the decision.
“A few of my friends decided to come here as well and they also are athletes, so we thoughtit would be cool to come here and go to a good school as well.” Rollins said.
Rollins, a junior guard from Angleton, Texas, began play- ing basketball when she was in elementary school.
“I started playing when I was 7, in second grade,” Rollins said. “It was just one of the first sports that my parents put us in, and I’ve just loved it ever since.”
This season Rollins averaged 14.9 points and 9.3 rebounds per game. She was rewarded for her efforts by being named First Team All-GSC. Rollins credits her success on the court to her “aggressiveness.”
“I try to bring energy to the court, and I think that with my aggressiveness people tend to follow,” Rollins said. “When I see Bailey [St. Clair] go and dive after balls, that makes me want to play harder. So I think that when I try to get rebounds it brings my team along to push their aggressiveness up as well.”
But Rollins is not content with this season’s successes and is excited at the potential the Lady Bisons have as a young team.
“Next season, I’m hoping to clinch that conference win, that conference championship. That was one of our goals this year that we didn’t quite accomplish although we made it to the tour- nament,” Rollins said. “I hope that we just continue to get better at basketball because we have a really good young team. That would be really awesome, my senior year, for us all to be one unit and clinch the [Great American Conference] title.”
As for the rest of the Lady Bisons, they “love her,” senior guard Bailey St. Clair said.
“She’s a great girl and a good leader on the court,” St. Clair said. “She encourages us to play better.”
