Barrington hits the boards, bounces Libertyville
How do you rebound from a 5-point halftime deficit?
By rebounding, if you’re the Barrington girls basketball team.
The Fillies went to the boards to rally from a 19-14 deficit at intermission and pulled out a 39-32 victory over Libertyville in the third round of the Bison Classic held at Maine South on Tuesday night.
Junior Angie Kirchoff (14 points) and senior Alexa Resch (11) were the top scorers for the Fillies, who improved to 2-1 in the Classic and 3-1 overall with their only loss to state power Maine South.
“Libertyville came out really intense,” said Resch, who led the Fillies with 8 rebounds. “You could see they really wanted to win.
“Coach (Babbi) Barreiro told us at half what we had to do to fix things. She said we had to box out and pick it up on the boards.”
Sophomore Bailee McDonald and freshman Megan Talbot each grabbed 7 rebounds and freshman Bryana Hopkins had 4 as the Fillies limited Libertyville to 2 points in the third quarter.
“We talked to them about controlling the boards and they did,” Barreiro said. “We held them to 2 points because of our rebounding.”
Libertyville led 7-2 in the first quarter but 2 free throws by Resch and back-to-back steals and layups by Kirchoff gave the Fillies an 8-7 advantage.
Becky Diechl hit a 16-footer from the baseline and the Wildcats (0-4, 0-1) led 9-8 after one quarter.
Libertyville got ahead 19-14 at the break with a 6-foot bank shot by Dana Kym and a pair of free throws by Tara Eyre with a minute left in the half.
The Fillies gradually cut into the lead in the second half and went ahead for good on Kirchoff’s driving layup with 2:42 left in the third quarter.
Resch made a nifty left-handed hook shot and added a free throw moments later for a 25-21 lead.
Resch’s driving layup gave Barrington its biggest lead at 33-25 with 3:54 left in the game.
A 3-pointer by Mayer and 2 free throws by Mary Wilterdink got Libertyville to within 35-32 with less than 40 seconds left. The Fillies sealed it with 2 free throws by Kirchoff and 2 by Aoife Callanan in the final 12 seconds.
“We picked up the intensity when we needed to,” Resch added. “We had height advantage and we had to use.”
Barreiro called it a tale of two halves for her young squad.
“Our big kids did a better job rebounding in the second half and Angie (Kirchoff) did a nice job taking control of the team,” she said. “Bailee (McDonald) gave us some nice minutes off the bench. We’ve done that a few times (slow starts in the first half). And that makes things difficult.”
Making her first start since suffering a concussion in the Wildcats opener against Prospect, senior Olivia Mayer (4 rebounds, 2 steals, 1 assist) led Libertyville with 11 points while Kym added 6.
“It was nice to have Olivia back,” said Wildcats first-year coach Greg Pederson. “She is still getting back into the swing of things. It will get better and better for her. She is our team leader.”
Kym also pulled down 7 rebounds with a steal while Sydney Mudd (2 assists) and Haley Hoeksel (2 steals) each had 3 rebounds.
“We are getting better,” Pederson added. “Free throw hurt us. We’ve got to be mentally tougher shooting them. And we have to be more careful with the basketball. I thought we defended them (Barrington) well. We’re getting better.”