Taylor Robertson is rebounding after losing her father to cancer

Most days used to be the same for Taylor Robertson.

She woke up, went to school carrying the excitement of the workout that followed. After practice, she grabbed dinner with more excitement for the workout that followed.

She and her dad walked into the gym together every day. She shot for hours while he rebounded. He told her how cool it would be if she went to his favorite university, Oklahoma.

She caught her rhythm with her dad – shot, catch, pass, shot. On weekends, they would spend up to eight hours a day on the court, and it never got old. The days ended and repeated, and then they didn’t.

Taylor Robertson’s father, Dave, died May 7 of colon cancer. He had fought it since his daughter was in sixth grade, beat it twice, but lost his battle after more than five years. He was 51.

Toward the end, he couldn’t make it to games; the sickness was getting to him. There were days spent at home vomiting, unable to eat, forced to listen on the radio.

But he made it to the gym one last time.

Robertson helped get McPherson to the Class 4A-Division I championship game in Salina against Bishop Miege. Her dad hadn’t found the strength to go to a game in weeks.

Before the girls championship, the father and daughter sat and watched the McPherson boys’ game. She could sense something was not right. He was trying to be himself, but he just couldn’t. He was not complete.

McPherson’s girls lost 66-59, but Robertson said with her dad in the stands, it was still “such a great game.”

More than 10 months later, Robertson walks into the gym without her life-long gym partner. Her mom, Terri, and brother, Alex, have taken his place under the hoop.

Sometimes she goes alone after dinner, and it’s hard, but basketball is Robertson’s best escape.

“This year, I’m just trying to play for him because he has meant so much to me,” she said.

Robertson has committed to OU, her dad’s favorite university. She will be a Sooner by summer. There were several schools that submitted scholarship offers. Wichita State had been following her since she was a second-grader.

McPherson coach Chris Strathman said he has never coached a more skilled player.

“She’s one of a kind,” he said. “Just incredible.

“The kids have so much respect for her and everything that she’s been through, but they also know that nobody that they’ve ever seen and nobody they’ll ever see spends as much time in the gym. And a lot of that time was spent with her dad.”

Thursday, Robertson broke the school scoring record with a first-quarter layup in the Bullpups’ 59-40 victory against Shawnee Mission South.

After Robertson scored her 1,594th point, Strathman called a timeout, and the public address announcer told Robertson and the rest of the Roundhouse the achievement. Robertson had no idea.

She took a moment for herself and her dad.

Friday, Robertson played in one of the most memorable games of her career, beating Class 6A power Olathe South 57-32 in a semifinal of the Mid America Classic. She scored 19.

Robertson, who averages 23.2 points, isn’t the most athletic player in Kansas, but she is among the most complete with a mind to go with her skill. In the third quarter Friday, she went after a loose rebound with an Olathe South player closing in from her front.

She reached and tipped the ball up and over the defender, who went racing by. It was a play that will never appear in the stat sheet but epitomizes all that she does.

Although Dave wasn’t in the stands for Saturday’s tournament championship game against reigning 6A champion Manhattan, Robertson said playing in it is more important than people may recognize.

The Bullpups were 11-1 after the semifinal victory and seem to be on a path toward another run at a Class 4A-DI championship.

There are still days that are more difficult than others to get through.

Basketball still makes her dad’s death go away. Some nights before a game and just after, Robertson thinks of him. Sometimes the thoughts are sad; sometimes empowering.

Despite all that has surrounded her life in the past calendar year, Robertson said this is the most fun she has had playing basketball, and she gets to continue at a school her dad dreamed of her going to.

Still, the days are different.

“Sometimes I just imagine him there,” Robertson said. “I just miss him, and I really wish he could rebound for me one more time.”

This story was originally published January 27, 2018 at 3:55 PM with the headline "Taylor Robertson is rebounding after losing her father to cancer."