Talbot's touch helps Barrington top Maine South

Megan Talbot showed her offensive versatility, and the Barrington Fillies showed their heart in Thursday's season opener at the Bison Classic.

Trailing Maine South 28-26 with 40 seconds left in the third quarter, Barrington went on a 15-6 run to gain a 41-35 lead with under two minutes left.

All 15 points were either 3-pointers (3) or free throws (6) by Talbot as the Fillies finished strong for a 46-38 girls basketball triumph.

"Threes (3-point baskets) are something different," said the 6-foot-2 Talbot who has signed a letter of intent to play for Illinois State. "I like doing a little bit of everything."

But she likes doing it with her team in mind.

"We just had a lot of energy and we really wanted to win," she said. "So we put everything we had into a team effort."

Talbot finished 8-for-8 at the free throw line with the three 3-pointers and a 2-point field goal for a game-high 19 points while classmate Abigail Elo chipped in 11 points with 6-of-6 free-throw shooting and one 3-pointer.

"Megan is an extremely versatile player," said Barrington coach Babbi Barreiro. "But what I liked the most about our game is that we did exactly what we had to do to put Megan in a position to do what she did, and she did it. Everyone pitched in and we got nice minutes off the bench."

Junior Claire Collier came off the bench to pull down 4 rebounds. "And those were four big ones," Barreiro said.

The Fillies trailed 13-2 less than five minutes into the game and 26-18 at half.

They came out with an 8-0 run in the third quarter and gave up just 2 points in the eight minutes.

Elo's steal and layup narrowed the deficit to 26-24 and a bucket by senior Auri Grayson (7 points, one 3-pointer) tied the game with 4:32 left in the third quarter.

"She (Elo) made a couple of nice defensively plays that sparked us at the start of the second half," Barreiro said.

Senior Jackie Ostojic (6 points) made nifty entry pass to classmate Sam Fagenholz (9 points), who converted a layup to give the Hawks their last lead at 28-26.

Talbot erased that deficit on the next possession with her first of three 3-pointers in less than four minutes.

"Three-pointers are fun," said Talbot, also an all-area volleyball player. "I usually don't get to shoot too many because I'm so tall. So I have been working on them."

"Obviously, Megan did a very nice job," Barreiro said. "It's nice to get individual performances but this was a good team win. Maine South is so well coached (by Mark Smith)."

Smith saw his team gain the big early lead as senior Riley Echkart hit a pair of first-quarter 3-pointers en route to her team-high 13 points.

"We didn't pack it in at any point," Barreiro said. "And we had a very nice fourth quarter."

"They made a lot of free throws (11-of-14 in the fourth quarter and 15-of-18 for the game)," Smith said of Barrington. "We didn't rebound very well defensively and we had a lot of two-on-one transition where we turn the ball over."

Junior point guard Kelly Katis handed out 3 assists made 4 steals.

"It was a little physical on the floor," said Katis, an all-area second baseman in softball. "But that's the game of basketball."

In the case of the Fillies - team basketball.