Montour tried a different approach against Hampton this time. But it was the same storyline.

Easy Hampton win.

Eighteen days after beating Montour in the WPIAL playoffs, Hampton breezed to a 57-38 victory against the Spartans in a PIAA Class AAA second-round game Tuesday night at North Hills.

Montour tried pressing Hampton more than it did in the WPIAL quarterfinals last month. The hope was to speed up the taller and more-experienced Talbots. And the hope was to stay closer than the 24-point loss (52-28) last time.

But Montour's season died a slow death.

After leading by 12 at halftime and by nine at the end of the third quarter, Hampton pulled away in the fourth.

Montour, which does not have a senior starter, finished 16-9, while Hampton (23-3) moved on to the PIAA quarterfinals Friday against West Mifflin.

"We did actually a lot of stuff different this time," said Montour coach Adam Kaufman.

"The first game we shied away from the press because of what you saw tonight. They're so tall that, even when you try to trap them, they throw it over the top.

"About the only thing we did differently that we had some success with was we basically said to a couple of [Hampton's] guys, 'We don't think you're a good shooter. We're going to stand in the paint and try to crowd the bigs.' "

But Hampton's "bigs" were still a little too much. T.J. Brown, a 6-foot-8 Hampton senior, had his best game in more than a month. Or at least his best quarter. Brown scored 11 of Hampton's first 13 points to stake the Talbots to a nine-point advantage.

Brown finished with 14 points while 6-7 senior Bill Luther had 13 and nine rebounds, and 6-5 senior Tim Donegan 12 points.

Brown had missed about four weeks of the season because of an injured ankle and also an eligibility issue.

"He came out and sparked us," said Hampton coach Joe Lafko.

"I would say that's the best he's played in over a month."

Kaufman was disappointed in his team's post defense early in the game, as Brown often caught the ball low and repeatedly turned to his right to score.

"For whatever reason, our guys lost their minds [defensively] in the first half," Kaufman said.

Still, Montour trailed by only 20-15 after the first quarter. That's when Hampton switched to a 2-3 zone defense and Montour could not solve it. Montour got only four shots in the second quarter and turned the ball over a number of times.

"Coach Lafko is a smart guy. You don't win that many games without knowing what you're doing," Kaufman said.

"They went to a zone and slowed the pace. The first quarter, we had them playing fast, which we needed to do. Once they got into that zone, our guys became hesitant."

Lafko said, "Our back line in that zone is 6-7, 6-8 and 6-5. They can control a lot of rebounds, and I think Montour had one offensive rebound the first half. ... Plus, that's a big backcourt to drive and penetrate against."

Hampton opened a 14-point lead on Luther's 3-pointer with 56 seconds left in the first half.

Montour came back and was able to cut the lead to 34-28 with 3:33 left in the third quarter, but Hampton went on an 11-0 run over the next 6 1/2 minutes to open a 45-28 lead with 5:20 left in the game.

From the second quarter until midway through the fourth, Montour made only 7 of 26 shots.

Junior center Austin Heter scored nine to lead Montour.

"The thing that's disappointing is I thought we had some of our better players get shots, but we just didn't knock them down," Kaufman said.

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