Central Mass Insider- "Horton is True Ladies Man"

Horton is True Ladies Man, Love of Daughters Keeps Basketball Star in Adopted Home of Worcester

January 8, 2009

By Ken Powers, Staff Writer CMass Insider

Worcester, MA --– It was a basketball question that needed a life answer. That’s exactly what stared straight into the face of Maurice “Mo” Horton in the Summer of 2007.

Firmly within his grasp was a full athletic scholarship to American International College (AIC) in Springfield for his final two years of school. It would be the realization of a life-long dream. It could even serve as the stepping stone to a life in professional basketball -- if not in the U.S., then certainly abroad.

Grasping Horton’s other hand, literally, were the small, fragile uncertain digits of his three daughters – Tayla, Natalie and Nariah – all under the age of four at the time.

What to do? Horton no doubt asked himself. What to do? What to do? What to do? In June he was going to AIC. He had not only told them so, he had signed a letter-of-intent.

In August Horton called the school and told officials there that he had had a change of heart. That he needed to be in Worcester, his adopted home. He needed to be close to his family. He needed to be with his children.

“I just thought it would be in my best interest to stay close to home and go to school around here. That would give me a chance to help take care of my kids and be a part of their lives,” Horton said. “My father died when I was four so I know what it’s like to grow up without your father around. I don’t want my kids to have to go through that.”

It’s fitting that family is what has kept Horton in Worcester because it’s what got him here in the first place. The 24-year-old Horton came to Worcester a decade ago, as a brash, 14-year-old who had grown up on the streets of Detroit, better known to many at the murder capital of the country. And he didn’t come willingly.

Horton was forcibly removed from the home of the automobile by his older brother Mario, who was a sophomore at Worcester State and a member of the basketball team when he went to fetch his little brother.

“I remember the day he came to get me,” Maurice said. “My mother told me he was coming and my reaction was, ‘so what? I don’t care. He hasn’t been in my life for years.’ But when I saw him, when he knocked on the door and I opened it and there he was, like some kind of larger than- life super hero character. He just looked at me and said, ‘let’s go.’ And I said, ‘OK.’”

It was more than just a big brother telling a little brother what to do. Mario Horton, at 6-foot-7, 240 pounds is larger than life in a lot of ways. All you really need to know about the pair is Maurice Horton is 6-4 and weighs 210 pounds and he is known throughout Worcester as “Little Mo,” while Mario is known in the city as “Big Mo.”

“I’m blessed just to have an older brother like Mario who would put his life on hold and come to Detroit and get me,” Maurice said. “There was nothing positive going on in my life at the time. It was all bad. I just remember being young and stupid and wild.”

Maurice Horton physically shudders when asked where he thinks he’d be now if he had spent the last 10 years in Detroit and not Worcester.

“In jail or dead,” he said quietly and slowly. “It was the environment and the life. I was young, I was not going to school. I was in the streets all night – selling drugs, carrying guns, driving with no license. Just doing crazy things. Things I would ever do now. Where would I be now if I was still in Detroit? In a box or in a cell, no question.”

It’s funny the difference a decade can make.

“My life is amazing to me,” Horton said. “I have a high school diploma, I’m going to college, I’m there for my family. I don’t think any of those things would have ever been possible if I had stayed in Detroit. But now, now I think I’ve become the type of person that can show people that you can do things.

“I have dreams of playing pro basketball, maybe they’ll come true, maybe they won’t, but just being able to have the chance to try and make those dreams come true, that’s what makes life great for me today.”

Life in Worcester hasn’t been without its tough moments for Maurice Horton, to be sure. He has been arrested twice on assault-and-battery charges, one in June of 2002, the other in February of 2003. Both cases ended up being dismissed.

The second arrest caused quite a stir and much controversy in Worcester because it came while Horton was leading his Burncoat High basketball team through the playoffs, despite having a court date on the charge awaiting him after the season. School officials appeared to give in to public scrutiny in the matter, suspending Horton for the Division 1 final, which Burncoat lost to St. John’s.

“I still hear about it sometimes,” Maurice Horton said. “Every now and then someone comes up to me and says, ‘hey aren’t you the guy’ ... and I just say, ‘yeah, that’s me, but that was a long time ago.”

The second assault and battery charge was against his ex-girlfriend, who Horton points out is the mother of his three children. He also points out that his ex-girlfriend’s parents posted his bail in reference to the charge.

“I know the truth, some other people, people directly involved, know the truth,” Maurice Horton said, “but there are a lot of people out there who think they know the truth about what happened, but they really have no idea what they’re talking about.”

What Horton likes to talk about most these days, other than his children, is basketball. And why not? Horton led the nation in scoring back in 2005-2006, pouring in 37 a game for Quinsigamond
Community College.

He followed that up with a 22-points-per-game average for the Chiefs in the 2006-2007 season, and then was off last year after his 11thh hour decision not to go to AIC. He’s played eight games so far for Worcester State, and Horton looks like he hasn’t missed a beat. Like that year off never happened. Horton is averaging 28 points, 12 rebounds, 3 assists and two steals per game for the Lancers, who have rebounded from an 0-3 start to enter the second semester of play with a 4-4 record.

Horton helped Worcester State go 3-1 during the first week of December and, for his efforts, was named Massachusetts State College Athletic Conference (MASCAC) Player of the Week and Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference (ECAC) Co-Player of the Week for his efforts.
“I think we’re learning to play together as a team,” Horton said about his first semester with the Lancers. “I think we felt like we should beat teams going in, but things just didn’t click right off. I think that’s because we were just coming in and playing games. Now we know it’s not just a game.

“Pickup games at the Y, summer league games at Friendly House, those are games,” Horton explained. “This is more than that, our careers are on the line. We’ve become more team oriented as the season has progressed. We go out together as a team. We hang out together. We’re beginning to jell. We’re becoming a family.”

Family. There’s that word again. It’s fitting that Horton used it, because he knows about family. He’s surrounded by his – mother Annie, grandmother Mary, brothers Mario, Mark, Obadiah, Alonzo and Marlon, sisters Fierra and Alicia.

“I’m a very family-oriented guy,” Maurice Horton said proudly. “I love my family, I want to always be there to help out my family. My family means a lot to me. I’ve always been that type of person.”

Talya, 5, Natalie, 4, and Nariah, 2, probably don’t know that yet, but they will over time.