MORGANTOWN, W. Va. – Even when "Press Virginia" made a second-half appearance, forcing 16 Baylor turnovers and cutting into a 21-point lead, the Bears still had enough to escape WVU Coliseum with an 85-73 win Monday night over a West Virginia team that beat Kansas just two days ago.
Led by season-high scoring performances from transfers Makai Mason (29) and Mario Kegler (18), Baylor won its third in a row overall and fourth in seven trips to Morgantown.
The Bears (12-6, 4-2 have now won three of four since losing 6-9 sophomore center Tristan Clark to a knee injury and moved into a three-way tie for second in the Big 12 with Texas Tech and Kansas State, just a half-game behind Kansas.
"It's so hard to steal a win on the road," said Mason, a grad transfer from Yale who came within two points of the career-high 31 he scored against Baylor in the NCAA Tournament three years ago. "We have to take advantage of every opportunity we can to steal one. I felt like we came out pretty relaxed and confident in the first half, got some easy looks that helped us get out to the early lead."
After turning it over just twice in the first half, Baylor didn't handle West Virginia's press and saw the Mountaineers (9-10, 1-6) whittle a 21-point deficit down to eight when James Bolden drained a 3-pointer that made it 63-55 with 3:33 remaining.
The Bears answered with a three-point play by Kegler on the other end as the sophomore transfer from Mississippi State scored nine of his season-high 18 points in the last 3 ½ minutes.
"That's the great thing with our team during these wins is we've had somebody different each and every game step up," coach Scott Drew said. "That's what it takes to win is a team. Right now, the team is really playing unselfish. They're sharing the ball and everybody is doing their job defensively and rebounding. As long as we can keep doing that, and making some shots, hopefully good things keep coming our way."
Kegler knocked down a pair of free throws to push the lead back to 13 before West Virginia scored four straight points to get it back within single digits. The Mountaineers had three shots on the same possession to make things even tighter, but Brandon Knapper missed a 3-pointer and Trey Doomes and Derek Culver both missed point-blank shots.
"Mark Vital's two free throws, Mario's 5-for-5 (from the line), those were huge," Drew said. "We never let them get it to seven points where the crowd could have really gotten into it and we could have gotten nervous."
That didn't happen. Kegler got another layup off a feed from Vital, then iced the game with two free throws with 26 seconds left.
"Obviously, with Tristan being out, we had to adapt," said Mason, who was 10-of-16 from the floor and 7-of-9 from the line. "He's such a great player, and we ran a lot of our offense through him. So, we definitely had to adapt a little bit and guys are stepping up. Guys are making shots that they make in practice. We just hadn't been doing that the first half of the season."
Devonte Bandoo hit three 3-pointers and gave the Bears their third double-figure scorer with 13 points. King McClure had eight points and a team-high eight rebounds, helping Baylor win the battle of the boards, 45-35, while 6-10 freshman Flo Thamba had five points, six rebounds and two assists in 16 minutes off the bench.
"Flo, Freddie (Gillespie), Mark, you needed all of them tonight because they were all in foul trouble," Drew said. "And each of them contributed. The three-headed monsters got it done. Mark was really good don the stretch to not foul out, get a lot of key rebounds, defensive stops. I thought he did a really great job with four fouls."
Baylor returns home to host Alabama (11-6) at 11 a.m. Saturday at the Ferrell Center. The Crimson Tide has wins over Arizona, Kentucky and Wichita State already and hosts 20th-ranked Ole Miss on Tuesday.