7/9 KANSAS (14-2, 3-1) 73, NR/NR BAYLOR (9-6, 1-2) 68
Saturday, Jan. 12, 2018
Ferrell Center (Waco, Texas)
Attendance: 9,091
 
BAYLOR POSTGAME QUOTES
 
Baylor Head Coach Scott Drew
Opening Statement…
"I want to thank our crowd. They did a great job helping us with that last run. I'm sorry we didn't give them more to cheer for early on. I was really pleased and proud of the team's effort. Anytime you outrebound a Kansas team like we did, I know our guys played hard, and I know they competed. The execution wasn't as good as any of us would have liked, but considering we had to put some new stuff in the last day, I was pleased with the effort the guys gave. That's why all year long we've enjoyed coaching them. Next couple weeks hopefully we get a lot better with our execution too."
 
On how Tristan Clark's injury changed the team's plans…
"You look at Tristan, and he's one of the NCAA leaders in field goal percentage. That's a pretty good guy to give the ball to because he finishes at a higher rate. The other thing is he did such a great job passing out of double teams and I thought defensively we were one of the top 10 shot-blocking teams in the nation percentage wise, and he was a big part of that. The irony is early on in the year, defense and rebounding helped us win games and coming into today's game in conference stats we had the number one offense in the Big 12 and lowest turnover percentage. It took us a couple weeks to get to that when we had everybody healthy and now we've got to do the same thing. That's the great thing about a team is it gives everybody opportunities to step up. I know everybody on the team was down and upset for Tristan, but we have good leadership and we have good character; these guys want to win and compete and now they've got an opportunity to do that in the Big 12."
 
On the team's character climbing back from large deficits…
"All year long these guys have competed. We haven't given up all year. As long as we keep doing that and as their execution gets better we'll be a much better team. As Jared (Butler) said, it's a little different. The shots came different with Tristan in our offense because we're running different things. Now, as coaches, that's the exciting thing of coaching – whatever players you have, you're trying to put them in positions to be successful. I think we just had figured it out with Tristan, now we've got to figure it out without him. It takes time to work on it. I know over the next couple weeks we'll be better."
 
Baylor Freshman Jared Butler
On the offensive struggles in the first half…
"I don't know the main reason for sure, but I want to say because we're running a different offense. Usually we play through Tristan (Clark), and we didn't play through that. It's different, a different feel. We're trying to find ways to get guys open shots, how to draw two and just try to find open shots. It was difficult and threw off our rhythm a little bit. Just a different game plan, different scheme, and it was difficult to adjust."
 
On his confidence after this game…
"It definitely means a lot for sure. I knew when Tristan (Clark) came out, everybody had to play a bigger role, play harder, play better. I just came into the game wanting to do that. Now we're adjusting without Tristan, I feel like I've got to play my part, be consistent, and just play hard, play to win."
 
Baylor Redshirt Sophomore Mark Vital
On how Tristan Clark's absence affected the team…
"We knew that before the game, that we'd just have to come in and play. We knew that we'd be motivated, Tristan motivated us. He told us what we needed to do so not really have Tristan out there (hurt). But our other players can score too."
 
On being motivated to rebound…
"Tristan (Clark) told us before the game that since he couldn't be out there, he wanted us to play as hard as we can and crash the boards. I took that personally. We got to step it up for Tristan, get the offensive rebounds, defensive rebounds, do everything we can to make it feel like he's still out there."
 
KANSAS POSTGAME QUOTES
 
Kansas Head Coach Bill Self
On tonight's game…
"I thought we played really well for the first 36 minutes. That's about the best we played from an efficiency standpoint. (Mark) Vital and company kicked our butt on the glass the first 36 minutes, and they destroyed us the last four (minutes). But I thought we did a lot of good things. We shot the ball better, we were efficient offensively, we totally controlled the game up 20 (points) at the under four timeout. And then I made a mistake and subbed, and it got all screwed up. Certainly, the story I'm leading with is that we got a good road win today and I thought that we played like crap the last four minutes."
 
On the surprise of Tristan Clark's absence…
"We're not bright enough, and I'm certainly not, to do a lot of different things right there, right before a game. So, we played exactly the same way we would've if he had played. To me, he would be a hard guy because how do you guard him on the post? If you send a second to him, that would obviously mess with your rotation. That was something that definitely affected us in a positive way that we didn't have to do that. If he was available, we would've had to ran a second guy at him and we don't play that way very often. We usually trap with our five. We don't trap with our guards. So that probably helped us a little bit with the preparation even though all we did was mention it. We didn't have time to do much else."
 
Kansas Junior Dedric Lawson
On finding out that Baylor's Clark was not playing…
"We found out right before the game during shootaround. It really didn't change much because we were going to play that same way, play the fives. They probably have a little bit more scoring things like that. They played really well. We have to tip our hat at Baylor. They played hard the whole 40 minutes, not matter who was in the game."
 
Kansas Senior Lagerald Vick
On closing out a game with Baylor's comeback each half…
"We just have to do a better job just finishing our games. Just win. Slow their offense down and press the ball on defense. (There's just) small things that we could've done better."