Fremd continues MSL dominance behind Todd’s 31 points
A dominant six-game winning streak in January put Fremd in position to extend its impressive run of outright or shared Mid-Suburban West titles to six Tuesday night.
A four-game winning streak gave Barrington the confidence and determination to pull off an upset on its home floor and stay in the division race.
The Fillies hung tough and trailed by just 5 points late in the first half and by 11 after three quarters. But Fremd (20-5, 8-0) produced a championship finish in the final eight minutes to clinch at least a share of the West crown with a 60-38 victory.
"Recently we sat down as a team and wrote down a bunch of goals we had," said Fremd junior Ella Todd, who had 31 points and 13 rebounds. "Our first one is to win the MSL and focus on one thing at a time. That's the first thing to check off the list and that was a big focus."
Todd, who scored her 1,000th career point against Conant, had 11 points in Fremd's 13-2 fourth quarter that sealed its 27th 20-win season and 13th MSL West title under coach Dave Yates. Brynn Eshoo had 13 points and 8 rebounds and senior Isabelle Zavilla scored 8 of her 10 points in the third quarter and finished with 5 rebounds.
"In the second half we had some fire to us and we pressured the ball more on defense," Zavilla said. "We felt we could play better and we showed up in the second half strong."
Barrington (14-9, 5-3) and 6-foot-2 Dayton-bound senior Molly O'Riordan (20 points, 15 rebounds) were giving Fremd fits in the first half. O'Riordan scored 14 points as the Vikings tried a diamond-and-one where Todd and Eshoo were primarily double-teaming her in the second quarter.
O'Riordan's jump hook cut the Barrington deficit to 29-24 with 12 seconds left in the half before Todd closed it with an impressive crossover drive in the lane to her right hand for a layup.
"I'm thrilled with how hard our kids played tonight," said Barrington coach Babbi Barreiro. "Ashley Mahlum had a fantastic game on Eshoo. Ella Todd is obviously super-talented and played a great game and she can hurt you in so many ways."
Yates decided the best way to help the Vikings was switching back to their man-to-man defense. They capitalized for 14 points off Barrington's 15 second-half turnovers.
"We knew we were capable of turning them over and consistency is the big thing for us," Todd said after Fremd scored 21 points off 22 Barrington miscues overall.
"We've been playing amazing since Christmas ... but this was one of the first halves we didn't and that's a credit to Barrington," Yates said. "They got after us and were really physical on defense and we didn't respond really well until the second half."
Barrington got within 47-36 on a rebound basket by sophomore Simra Alam (9 points, 5 rebounds) to end the third quarter.
"Fremd's a good team and we were all fight," Barreiro said. "If anything at times we were playing so hard we were out of control."
Todd's driving baseline jumper started a 10-0 run in the fourth to put away the game.
"At halftime we talked as a team about what motivates us most," Zavilla said. "Winning the West was one of our main goals right now to check off the list."