Box Score By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Foundation
Baylor just needs to figure out how to take the Ferrell Center on the road.
Sticking with a season-long pattern, the 25th-ranked Bears started fast at home, survived a second-half run by Oklahoma State and then pulled away in the last 10 minutes to knock off the visiting Cowboys, 79-62, Tuesday night before a crowd of 5,665.
"That's life in the Big 12. One game, you start out like crud and the next game you start out well," said Baylor coach Scott Drew, whose team improved to 11-3 overall, 10-0 at home and 1-1 in the Big 12. "I'll sleep better tonight than I did the other night. But I thought Rico (Gathers) really set the tone inside and was tremendous on the glass."
The 6-foot-8 Gathers had a monster game, recording his 31st career double-double with 17 points and 17 rebounds and becoming the first player in program history to grab 1,000 career rebounds (1,005 and counting). He also outrebounded OSU (9-5, 1-1) on Baylor's offensive end, 12-11, and came within one board of matching the Cowboys overall, 18-17.
"I never thought I would be able to reach a milestone like that in my college career," Gathers said. "One of the main reasons I came back for my senior year was to cement my legacy here. Being able to reach the 1,000 (points), 1,000 (rebounds) milestone is definitely a blessing."
After getting down by 20 in the first seven minutes on the road in Saturday's 102-74 loss at newly ranked No. 1 Kansas, the Bears used a pair of early runs to go up by double digits, 21-10, on a driving scoop layup by Taurean Prince that forced coach Travis Ford to call his second timeout in a one-minute span.
"You're going to get Baylor's best effort coming out of the gate because of what happened Saturday," Ford said. "If this team is any good at all, they're going to respond to that. And they did. We knew they would. We were totally on our heels. They played with a little chip on their shoulder."
Sophomore guard Al Freeman, who scored 14 of his game-high 21 points in the first half, said the Bears wanted to "get off to a fast start and let your presence be known and really go at your opponent's throat and protect your home court."
Baylor did just that, going up by as many as 18 when point guard Lester Medford drained all three free throws when he was fouled on a 3-point attempt with 5:16 left in the opening half.
To their credit, the Cowboys didn't go away. They used a 9-0 run to cut it back to a single-digit deficit on freshman Jawun Evans' 3-pointer and went into the break down by an even dozen, 45-33.
OSU came out on fire in the second half, hitting its first four shots and pulling within three, 59-56, on a Chris Olivier layup with 10:35 left in the game.
But that's when the Baylor defense clamped down, holding the Cowboys to just one bucket over the next 10 minutes before a meaningless 3-pointer by Leyton Hammonds with just 22 seconds left.
The Bears reeled off 17 unanswered points, starting with a pair of buckets by Terry Maston off offensive rebounds by Prince. Drew said Maston, who had eight points and four rebounds in 17 minutes off the bench, "was huge."
Finishing the run, Prince drove the baseline for a layup and hit a short jumper, then Gathers followed a Prince miss with another offensive board and tip-in to make it 76-56 with 3:17 left on the clock.
Baylor dominated the boards, 44-18, including a 23-7 edge on the offensive glass, and outscored OSU, 18-7, on second-chance points. Prince had 14 points, seven rebounds and four assists and is now two points shy of becoming the Bears' 30th 1,000-point scorer.
Medford had 11 points and seven assists, giving Baylor its fourth double-figure scorer, while Jeffrey Carroll had 15 and Jeff Newberry 10 for the Cowboys.
"We should have put them away early, but basketball is a game of runs," Gathers said. "I'm glad we took care of business in the last seven minutes and we were able to get a sustainable lead on them and close out the game."
Baylor will go back on the road to face No. 13/14 Iowa State (11-2, 0-1) at 2 p.m. Saturday in Ames, Iowa, in a game that will be televised by ESPN2. The Cyclones are coming off an 87-83 loss at Oklahoma and host Texas Tech Wednesday night.
