Box Score By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Foundation
These kinds of games are a big reason why Kansas has strung together 11 consecutive Big 12 championships and is well on its way to its 12th.
Dominated on the glass for most of the game and trailing by as many as eight in the second half, the second-ranked Jayhawks grabbed offensive boards on four straight possessions and held 19th-ranked Baylor to just eight points in the last eight minutes to escape with a 66-60 victory before a Ferrell Center crowd of 8,259.
"I was proud of how we competed and played for about 36 minutes, and then I wish we could do that last four minutes over again," said Baylor coach Scott Drew, whose team fell to 20-8 overall and 9-6 in the Big 12, snapping a two-game winning streak against ranked teams.
"I don't think we executed as well as we'd like. We didn't rebound as well as we'd like. But I think we've seen marked improvement from the first time we played them. There are no moral victories, but I like how we're headed in the right direction."
Frank Mason III and Perry Ellis carried Kansas (24-4, 12-3) for most of the night, combining for 34 points. But down the stretch, it was Landen Lucas and Wayne Selden Jr. that helped the Jayhawks pull this one out.
Landen grabbed three offensive boards down the stretch and gave Kansas the lead for good with a layup at the 3:30 mark, while Selden came out of a long funk for a dunk off an alley-oop pass from Devonte' Graham and then pretty much iced it with a shot clock-beating runner that made it 62-57 with 27 seconds left.
"Those two really struggled the first half," KU coach Bill Self said of Lucas and Selden, "and they weren't the only ones. But certainly those play they both made down the stretch - Wayne did a great job on (Taurean) Prince, those offensive rebounds were special, the drive and the scoop shot and the lob catch were great. . . . To control the glass for at least an eight-minute stretch when we haven't controlled it the whole game was huge for us."
The Bears remained winless all-time (0-16) against No. 1 or No. 2-ranked teams, but they were definitely in this to win it.
Overcoming an early 6-0 deficit on the boards to finish with an 18-11 edge at halftime, Baylor came from five points down to tie it, 33-33, on a Rico Gathers layup off a sweet dish from Johnathan Motley. And then, when Selden was called for an offensive foul with 1.9 seconds left, Gathers took a length-of-the-court pass from Ishmail Wainright and drained a 3-pointer from the corner - his first 3-point attempt on his 836th career shot - for a 36-33 lead at the break.
"He's been working on that corner 3, so he was glad he got the chance to show it off," Drew said. Asked if that was really the play that was called, Drew said, "Well, no, but it worked. I thought that gave us great momentum."
Feeding off that momentum, the Bears took their largest lead of the game, 45-37, when Wainright swished in a 3-pointer after stealing the ball from Jamari Traylor.
Terry Maston answered a pair of Ellis free throws with a sweet hook shot for his only points of the game. But as they've done all year - and most of the last 12 years - the Jayhawks had an answer. Graham began a 9-0 run with a 3-pointer, followed by a Mason runner off the glass and back-to-back buckets by Traylor to go up 48-47 with about 10 minutes left. Freeman, who scored a team-high 17 points, answered a Graham 3-pointer with a go-ahead trey of his own to put the Bears back up, 52-51. Baylor missed its next three shots and turned it over once, going nearly four minutes without scoring, before Freeman drained another 3-pointer at the 4:11 mark for a 55-53 lead.
The Bears simply didn't have an answer down the stretch, though, getting outscored 13-5 in the final four minutes.
"They got some 50-50 balls and some offensive rebounds that really made the difference at the end of the game," Freeman said. "We had the lead the majority of the game. We were winning the battle on the glass, we were turning them over, getting in transition and getting to the free throw line. The last four minutes were just tough. . . . We get in this position again at the end of the game, we're going to remember this and put the next team away."
Baylor finished with a 33-28 edge on the boards and turned it over two fewer times (12-10), but Kansas had a 15-14 edge in second-chance points and shot 50 percent from the field while holding the Bears to just 36 percent.
"Normally, we do a pretty good job blocking out the wings flying in and put a body on the bigs," Drew said. "The big thing is we get 20 offensive rebounds, they get 12; and they get 15 second-chance points, we get 14. They were just more efficient when they did get them."
After averaging 25.5 points in his last two games, Motely hit just 3-of-10 from the field and was held to eight points and six rebounds. Prince was the Bears' other double-figure scorer with 12, but hit just 4-of-13 from the field and 1-of-6 from outside the arc.
"It's sad to say, but they probably just wanted it more than we did," Prince said. "That's what it seemed like. Their guys were flying in, and we weren't blocking out and doing our job. That's on us."
Baylor was 16-0 when leading at half and 20-0 when leading at any point in the second half, but saw both of those streaks come to an end.
The Bears return to the road to play TCU (11-17, 2-13) at 7 p.m. Saturday and No. 3 Oklahoma (21-5, 9-5) at 7 p.m. Monday before closing out with a home game against No. 14 West Virginia (21-7, 10-5) at 1 p.m. March 5.
