Just about every day, Marian Catholic’s Taylor Bolton walks past a series of large photos on a wall in a hallway near the gym that commemorate the school’s postseason accomplishments.
The long line ends with three girls basketball teams that won Class 3A sectional championships the past three seasons for the Spartans. Bolton, a senior forward, is in all three of those photos.
There’s still some room for more photos to be added to that wall, and Bolton hopes to be up there one more time with a picture from this season. But she also wants it to be different.
“This year, I know we’re going to get past our little hump,” she said.
That “little hump” is losing three supersectional games and being denied a trip to state.
Marian Catholic has been busy building the resume of the top seed in a 16-team sectional, and that continued Saturday in a 53-40 East Suburban Catholic Conference win over St. Viator.
Bolton scored a game-high 21 points for the host Spartans (22-6, 6-3), who had a special guest as Cardinal Blase Cupich took in the game in Chicago Heights as a part of Catholic Schools Week.
Senior forward LaParis Poe added 12 points for Marian Catholic, which will find out Thursday if the Spartans are indeed the top seed of the sectional that they will be hosting,
Ava Garcia scored 15 points for St. Viator (17-10, 3-7). The Lions lost to Marian 37-36 on Jan. 8 in Arlington Heights and trailed by only five points with 6:44 remaining in Saturday’s game.
Bolton, however, scored eight points the rest of the way to help the Spartans pull away. That included a couple of tough inside baskets while drawing fouls.
“I’m super proud of her because that’s not always been her game,” Marian coach Dan Murray said of Bolton. “I’m not putting her game down at all, but this is her being a senior leader and understanding that she needed to step up at crunch time.
“She did that after she missed a couple of wide-open threes. She just kept fighting back. That shows how much she has grown as a player and what kind of leader she has been for us.”
Bolton was getting frustrated by the missed 3-pointers but decided to drive into traffic anyway.
“I did what my team needed me to do,” Bolton said. “I was lucky to hit a few shots. I’ve definitely developed my aggression this year and late in my junior year. I was never like this.
“I used to be, ‘This is what I do and if it doesn’t work, I don’t know what else to do.’’’
Poe said she enjoys playing with Bolton because of that.
“Honestly, Tay gives us the energy and the spark,” Poe said. “She gives us the motivation and we carry on with that same energy.”
Poe also is in those three sectional championship photos with Bolton.
“It’s crazy to see the pictures back-to-back-to-back and see the evolution of us,” Poe said. “It’s nice to see. We’re looking for the Final Four this year.
“I feel like we we’re better than last year because if you stop Taylor, you have me. If you stop me, you have Ty (Jackson). If you stop Ty, you have Alainna (Poisson). It’s so hard to stop us because everybody is able to do their own things.”
While Bolton has been doing team things for Marian, she doesn’t have a college picked out yet. She wants to be a sports psychologist.
“I’m always the kid they go to for advice,” she said. “I feel that’s something I would be good at because I’m already doing it now.”
Jeff Vorva is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
