Story by
Towson PG Jon Barton plays to honor late mother: ‘Everything I do is for her’
- Story by
- Towson PG Jon Barton plays to honor late mother: ‘Everything I do is for her’
Jon Barton literally wears his love for his mother on his sleeve.
Tattooed inside the Towson point guard's right bicep is her name, LaTonya Barton, and "11-03-21" — the date of her death — is affixed just below the top of the shoulder, with flowers adorning the rest of the arm. Jon Barton pulled aside his practice shirt to reveal her smiling face inked on his right pec.
Advertisement
"This season, everything is dedicated for my mom," he said.
Barton, a 6-foot-3, 210-pound redshirt freshman, is expected to succeed Dylan Williamson this winter as the Tigers' floor general. In a 62-50 exhibition win against Delaware on Oct. 17, Barton got the start and amassed 17 points, three steals, two assists and two rebounds.
Coach Pat Skerry favorably compared Barton to a current NBA star who recently led the New York Knicks to their first NBA championship in 53 years.
"Got a little Jalen Brunson in him," Skerry said of their determined personalities. "Now he's got to stay humble and hungry, but the best guys we've kind of had really haven't been a lot of highly rated guys, and they've just worked."
Advertisement
Barton's road to basketball was paved by his mother. The former LaTonya McConico excelled at Friendly, earned a spot on the Washington Post's All-Metro team in 1988, and accepted a full scholarship to continue playing at Radford before marrying Timothy Barton.
The couple raised three children, Tim Jr., Carolae and Jon, and all of them played basketball at St. John's College in Washington. On Nov. 3, 2021, the children were pulled out of class and informed by their father that their mother died at 51 of a heart attack in the family's kitchen.
Jon Barton, a 14-year-old freshman at the time, was devastated, running into the school hallway and punching a hole into a wall. He admitted that his mother's death took a toll on his psyche.
"I was mad at the world," he said. "I questioned God. I just didn't understand. I was a 14-year-old kid. I just didn't understand why my mom. She was such a down-to-earth woman. She wouldn't hurt a fly. She loved everyone. She gave out her heart. She was just a down-to-earth person. Nobody ever said anything bad about my mom. And I was just questioning God for the longest time."
Advertisement
With help from his father and siblings, Barton recommitted himself to basketball, which he said his mother would have wanted. He credited her with instructing him on how to position himself for hook shots and other basketball fundamentals.
Barton considered it especially poignant that the first college to make him an offer was Radford, her alma mater.
"I didn't end up going to Radford, of course, but I just knew she was watching over me, and she's keeping her healing hand over me," he said.
Barton's performance in the exhibition against Delaware was powered in part by his mother's memory, sophomore power forward Jaquan Womack said.
Advertisement
"After the game, he was talking to me. He was telling me he knows his mom was watching him, and I'm telling him, 'I'm proud of you, bro,'" Womack said. "I have reasons why I came back, but that was a big reason for me coming back because I know JB was going to be playing and I wanted to see this man go through his first year playing college basketball. That's like my brother. So his mom is my mom."
Barton said a promise he made to his mother continues to resonate.
"I held her hand, I kissed her forehead, and I said, 'Everything I do with basketball, I'm going to go hard for you,'" he said. "So everything I do is for her."
Barton has a sympathetic ear in Skerry, who lost his father, David, on March 11. The two are close, with Barton saying he doesn't mind Skerry challenging him in practices and games.
Advertisement
"We've hit Jon pretty hard," Skerry acknowledged. "But I think Jon's the kind of guy that he has a little bit of an edge to him. As long as he keeps that chip like he's got something to prove, he's got a chance to have a really good basketball career. He's a great kid."
Towson opens the season at Santa Clara on Nov. 2. Barton said he plans to spend the next day remembering his mother on the fifth anniversary of her death.
Related Articles
"I know she's going to be there in spirit," he said. "I just feel like she's on the court with me. I enjoy playing basketball because I just feel like that's my way of connecting with her."
Advertisement
Barton's siblings also play as a tribute to their mother. Tim Jr. is a junior forward at the Merchant Marine who averaged 12 points and 7.7 rebounds last winter, and Carolae is a junior forward also at the Merchant Marine who has averaged 16.6 points, 12.8 rebounds and 2.2 assists in two years.
Barton, who was encouraged by his mother to switch from football to basketball when he was 11, said he knows what she would say if she saw him now.
"She'd be like, 'I told you so,' and she'd want me to keep going for her," he said. "So I really just want to make her proud in everything I do, and I really do love my mom, and every day I think about her. There's not a day that doesn't go by that I don't think about my mom."
Have a news tip? Contact Edward Lee at eklee@baltsun.com , 410-332-6200 and x.com/EdwardLeeSun .
