Rollyson still dazzles on the court

By Dan Stillwell
Register-Herald Sports Writer

July 18, 2008 11:37 pm

— At 28, Laura Rollyson is often the oldest player on the floor playing summer basketball in the Beckley Women’s League.
She just might be the league’s best player as well.
Whether it’s scoring, passing or defense, the former Summers County all-stater does it all as player-coach for the Spartans.
“Laura is phenomenal,” Concord University forward Sierra Brown said. “She’s by far the best I’ve ever played with or against.”
Rollyson scored 28 points and made at least eight assists — mostly to Brown — Thursday night as the Spartans downed a talented Beckley squad 69-58.
Many of her opponents were half her age.
“God gave me the ability to just go out and play,” said Rollyson, who scored 1,386 points from 1995-97 at Summers. “It’s just fun for me.”
Spartans led Beckley throughout despite having just five players. Rollyson, an assistant for two-time defending AA state champion Summers, coached three of them.
“I never got to play with (Brown, Olivia Newsome and Kelsey Brewer, along with ex-Wyoming East star Amy Brewer), but it’s truly an honor to play with them,” she said. “They’re a great group of kids.”
Several other Spartans players, including 2008 state player of the year Jolysa Brown and former all-state center Joanna Mills, have had to miss several games because of a church camp.
It was grueling, but Rollyson had as much or more fun than her teammates.
“I can coach all day, but it’s never like playing it,” she said. “Five players is all we need, and that’s two games in a row we’ve won with (five).”
She was going as strong in the final minute as she was in the first.
“I’m not in the best shape of my life by any means, but I can still play a game and feel fine,” Rollyson said. “I could probably play another game if I had to.”
If anything, she’s an even better scorer now than she was 10 years ago.
“It comes to love of game and passion. I want to get it done,” she said. “I hate to lose.”
She bleeds Bobcat orange, but she hated losing to Summers in last year’s summer league championship game.
The players she helped coach to the AA crown beat her Spartans 51-46.
Rollyson led all scorers with 22 points.
“I especially don’t like to lose to Summers County. We had a lot of alumni players and we should have won the game,” she said. “But we didn’t, and if my team can’t win it, there’s nobody I’d rather win than Summers.”
Playing in the summer league pays a sneaky added dividend.
“We play all those (good) teams like Princeton and Woodrow, and when the high school team plays them, I already know what they do,” Rollyson said. “I can give coach (Wayne) Ryan a head’s up.”
Admittedly, she feels the bumps and bruises a bit more these days. But Rollyson has no plans to stop playing.
After all, she’s far from the oldest player in the league.
“It definitely hurts a little more in the morning, but if Kristin Staples and Lisa Griffith (who graduated in the late 1980s) can do it, hopefully I can do it.
“They were great high school and college players. They’re definitely my idols.”

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