Oct. 20, 2017
By Zac Ellis
VUCommodores.com
NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Don’t let Cierra Walker’s 5-foot-8 frame fool you. She once considered suiting up to play high school football.
“My dad was all for it, but my mom was like, ‘You aren’t getting hurt,'” Walker recalled. “Instead, I played powderpuff football and was the quarterback all four years of high school.”
A penchant for pigskin was nothing new to Walker, now a sophomore guard on Vanderbilt women’s basketball team. She discovered a talent for football as an eight-year-old competitor in the NFL’s “Punt, Pass & Kick” competition. Walker’s father, Cliff, had participated in the program as a kid, so the younger Walker decided to give it a try.
The contest scores contestants on one pass, one punt and one kick, all weighed against participants in the same age group. Soon, “Punt, Pass & Kick” became a yearly ritual for Walker. She was so skilled that she became a three-time national finalist and competed at halftime of three NFL playoff games.
Walker is known to send a kick sailing beyond 40 yards. But her first performance in front of a packed playoff crowd – at an Indianapolis Colts game when she was nine – required a different kind of talent.
“I was so nervous,” Walker said. “I’m just this little girl at the time. It was so nerve-wracking.”
Compared to that kind of pressure, Walker feels right at home on the hardwood at Memorial Gym. The Oregon City, Ore. native was a member of head coach Stephanie White’s first recruiting class in 2016, the highest-rated class in Commodores history. That five-member group played a big role in White’s first season on West End.
Walker provided much of that freshman spark. She played in 22 games in 2016-17, earning 12 starts before stress fractures sidelined her for the bulk of the season’s second half. Walker scored in double-figures six times, including a career-high 21 against SIUE on Dec. 3, and was regularly the team leader in assists.
The Commodores noticed an immediate impact from Walker’s free-wheeling style.
“During nonconference play, we couldn’t take her off the floor,” White said. “She’s a high-IQ kid, she plays with good pace, she can shoot well and she can facilitate. Once she was injured, not having her out there hurt us.”
Now healthy, Walker expects bigger things as part of a seasoned sophomore class. That group played significant minutes in adjusting to college in 2016-17, landing forwards Kayla Overbeck and Erin Whalen on the SEC All-Freshman Team. This year, Vanderbilt also adds six new faces to its roster: freshman guard Chelsie Hall, freshman forward Autumn Newby, freshman center Blessing Ejiofor, freshman center Paige Warren, Purdue graduate transfer Bree Horrocks and Boston College transfer Mariella Fasoula.
Fasoula must sit out this coming season to fulfill NCAA transfer requirements but joins Ejiofor, Horrocks and Warren as four new players listed at 6-4 or taller. The key, however, might be Walker and the sophomores, who feel more like veterans after a year immersed in White’s culture at Vanderbilt.
“We were thrown into the fire last year,” Walker said. “But having that experience helps us. Now we’re not as nervous. We know the offense, we know what Coach White expects, we know what team expectations are.”
White knew Walker was special during the first team gathering at the coach’s house. In White’s backyard, the then-freshman threw a couple of tight spirals with a football. That prompted a double-take from her new head coach.
Now, after a year at Vanderbilt, White is accustomed to Walker’s athleticism. The coach expects plenty from the skilled sophomore this season, as well.
“I was like, no wonder she can play football,” White said. “Her talents don’t surprise me. Cierra is very focused, very competitive and even stubborn at times. To be great, you have to be.”
Zac Ellis is the Writer and Digital Media Editor for Vanderbilt Athletics.
