I was shocked and saddened Sunday when I found out the news of the passing of Latasha Roundtree. Tasha, as she was known by friends and teammates, was a guard for the Washington girls basketball team the last three years. She died from gunshot wounds received Saturday night in Cedar Rapids.

Tasha was a team leader for the Warriors during her career, especially her senior campaign. She had an infectious personality that all at Washington High School seemed to enjoy. While she was not the most outgoing person on the team, she was well liked and usually had a smile on her face.

It had been a hard life for Tasha. She lost her mother some six years ago, the victim of another senseless crime when her mother's car was hit during a drag race on Mount Vernon Road. Tasha also had to endure not one, but two major knee injuries during her basketball career, something that is very difficult to deal with once, let alone twice in a span of four years.

I remember vividly the first time I watched Tasha on the basketball court. It was during her freshman year when she was playing on the Washington sophomore team and the Warriors were playing at Xavier. I watch the sophomore games after setting up equipment and while talking to the head coaches and going over notes for the varsity contest.

It didn't take long to see that Tasha Roundtree was a terrific player and would be a difference maker some day. She was the prototypical Warrior basketball player that Coach Frank Howell looks for, quick and athletic. She played intense defense and was very good in transition. I remember asking Coach Howell that very night about this young skinny freshman and I remember him telling me that if she continues to improve she will be a difference maker. He was right.

Tasha's senior season was terrific. She averaged just under 10 points a game as the Warriors' starting point guard for a team that was rated in the Class 4A polls most of the year. More importantly, she was one of the best passers in the Metro and the state. She averaged over five assists a game her final year, which was right there among the best in Iowa. More often than not she would pass the ball off to an open teammate than shoot herself.

It was her goal to reach the state tournament in her final year. In what turned out to be her final game, the regional final at Kennedy against Iowa City High, she was having perhaps her finest game of her career. Roundtree had scored 19 points into the third quarter and was keeping the Warriors even with the Little Hawks until fate intervened. She went for a steal and fell awkwardly, injuring her knee for the second time in her career. She was helped off the court and was tended to by trainers and administrators, but was in too much pain to go back in. The Warriors lost the game and her high school career was over.

I was happy to hear that Tasha had agreed to play basketball for William Penn University in Oskaloosa. But they wanted her to red-shirt this year and rehab her knee, and for whatever reason, she left school and came back to Cedar Rapids. If she had stayed in Oskaloosa, who knows, things may have turned out differently.

I will miss Tasha as a basketball player for sure, but as a person more. While I didn't get to know her well off the court, she was someone who genuinely seemed to enjoy life and sharing it with her friends and teammates.

An act like this makes us take notice the fact that sports is just a small portion of our lives. But, I'm grateful that sports gave many of us the opportunity to get to know and watch Tasha Roundtree.

Rest in peace.

(Scott Unash is the sports and program director at KGYM-AM 1600 (FM 107.5 and 106.3). He is a six-time winner of the Iowa Broadcast News Association play-by-play Announcer of the Year Award. Scott and Mark Dukes co-host the Gym Class weekdays from 3-4 p.m. on KGYM-AM 1600, FM-107.5 and FM-106.3)