By Marissa Essenburg | Sports Writer
If you’ve watched women’s college basketball, checked a box score, caught a broadcast or even followed Baylor casually over the past four years, chances are you know the name Darianna Littlepage-Buggs. She has stacked double-doubles, big-time accolades and steady dominance across her career in the green and gold.
Four years ago, she arrived at Baylor with five-star pressure and All-American expectations, stepping into a program with a history of greatness and the challenge of finding her footing on a new stage. From the start, that freshman made it clear she belonged, quickly emerging as a college basketball phenom. Today, she’s the heartbeat of the No. 7 team in the nation — a senior whose dependability and steady dominance have become the foundation of Baylor women’s basketball.
An Oklahoma City native, Littlepage-Buggs has never been a stranger to success or the work required to reach it. Ranked No. 17 nationally and the No. 3 forward in her class by ESPN HoopGurlz, Littlepage-Buggs capped her career at Classen High School by leading her team to an Oklahoma state championship. She averaged 15.5 points, 12.8 rebounds and 2.7 assists per game as a senior, earning Oklahoma Gatorade Player of the Year honors and a coveted spot among the 24 McDonald’s All-Americans.
That drive followed her to Waco, becoming the through-line of everything she’s done.
“Her expectations, who she is and what she wants from her senior year, what she wants for herself, combined with her team — Buggs is about winning, and I’ve never questioned that,” head coach Nicki Collen said.
Her freshman season set the tone for everything that followed, as she captured Big 12 Freshman of the Year and earned eight Big 12 Freshman of the Week honors, the second-most in conference history and the most ever by a Baylor player. Now a senior, she continues to earn national recognition, most recently landing on the John Wooden Award Most Outstanding Player Top 50 Women’s watch list.
But for Littlepage-Buggs, this final season is about much more than the awards. It’s about perspective — learning to embrace the highs, the hard moments and everything in between.
“I’m taking it all in, the joys, the challenges,” she said. “That’s one thing I’ve come to learn and love — loving the challenges even in moments when it’s so hard.”
And it’s about leadership, a role she and fellow senior forward Bella Fontleroy have grown into together.
“This has definitely been a change for all of us, especially for me and Bella,” Littlepage-Buggs said. “We’re the leaders now, and people look up to us like we looked up to our seniors. Just loving the process, because this is our last one.”
That leadership has already been tested early, in a season that four games in has already brought its share of highs and lows — something Littlepage-Buggs said is just part of the journey and a testament to the group around her.
On Sunday, that same leadership showed up on the floor. Fontleroy and Littlepage-Buggs powered a performance to remember, one that saw Littlepage-Buggs find the rhythm she’d been searching for this season — finishing with 26 points and 11 rebounds, including a perfect 10-for-10 stretch before halftime, as Baylor rolled Le Moyne 99-43.
“The first three games I felt like I was rushing a lot, and it has been tough,” Littlepage-Buggs said. “So to have a game like this, and for my teammates to see me and keep getting me the ball and encouraging me this far, building and stacking days, this game was needed for sure.”
To Collen, it was a performance that reflected the kind of leader Littlepage-Buggs has become.
“That’s a kid that’s going to get in the gym and give you the same thing regardless of where she’s at,” Collen said.
That unwavering consistency has made her the anchor of this Baylor team.
Four years in, Littlepage-Buggs’ name sits in the same conversation as the Baylor greats who came before her — not because of one season or one stretch, but because of that standard she’s carried every day she’s worn a Baylor jersey. Her legacy isn’t finished, but it’s already written across record books, watch lists and the trust of a program that has leaned on her since the moment she arrived.
“It hasn’t sunk in at all,” Littlepage-Buggs said. “I think about how long I’ve been here and what it was like coming in as a freshman with all my upperclassmen, and then it being me, Bella and Kyla [Abraham] these last few years. That’s something I hold close to my heart because, through everything, it’s still been us. It’s crazy, but I’m so happy. This journey has been amazing, and I’ve enjoyed every bit of it. I’m here to live in the moment and cherish it all.”
