No. 1/1 WBB Wins Big 12 Title Outright

Saturday, February 23

Ames, Iowa

3 p.m.

Baylor

25-1, 15-0 (#1)

Iowa State

20-7, 10-5 (#20)

Baylor

Iowa State

No. 1/1 WBB Wins Big 12 Title Outright

2/23/2019 5:38:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score PDF Box Postgame Notes Highlights

Chloe Jackson and Juicy Landrum scored 18 and 16 points, respectively.

  AMES, Iowa – Baylor's not going to share any part of its ninth consecutive Big 12 regular-season championship.
            The top-ranked Lady Bears (25-1, 15-0) clinched the outright title on Saturday with a 73-60 road win over No. 20/21 Iowa State (20-7, 10-5) at Hilton Coliseum. That gives Baylor a four-game lead over 19^th-ranked Texas (21-6, 11-4) with three games to play.
            Baylor's backcourt duo of Chloe Jackson and Juicy Landrum scored 18 and 16 points, respectively, to help offset Bridget Carleton's second 28-point outburst against the Lady Bears this season. Kalani Brown had 14 points, seven rebounds and two blocks, while Lauren Cox flirted with her first career triple-double, finishing with nine points, 14 boards and seven assists.
            But, this game was won on the defensive end.
The Lady Bears held the Cyclones to just 31.7 percent shooting overall (19-of-60) and a dismal 18.5 percent from 3-point range (5-of-27). Iowa State came into the game among the national leaders, averaging nine made 3-pointers per game.
            "I think you've got to credit our defense," Baylor coach Kim Mulkey said. "We're not going to let them just spot up and shoot 3's all day. Holding those guys to five 3's is just a tremendous effort. That was our focus. Sometimes, you have to make decisions. . . . When you play Iowa State, sometimes it's better to give up twos than threes. I thought when they penetrated, we stayed between them and the rim."
            In a game where Baylor never trailed, the Lady Bears were up by 10 at the end of the first quarter and had a 20-point lead late in the half before the Cyclones closed to within 44-28 on a pair of Alexa Middleton free throws.
            Despite not hitting a field goal in the last six minutes of the third quarter, Iowa State at least made things interesting when Carleton hit three free throws with 0.1 seconds left to pull the Cyclones back within 63-45.
            That momentum carried into the fourth quarter, when they scored the first seven points and eventually trimmed the deficit to single digits, 65-56, when Carleton drove inside for a layup.
            "I shot the ball a lot more than I did in the first half," said Carleton, who scored 20 of her 28 points in the second half, knocking down a pair of 3-pointers and 8-of-9 from the line. "I was just trying to attack the rim and get something going. We were stagnant offensively in the first half, so I was attacking when they were closing out on me."
            One of the keys against Iowa State, Mulkey said, is not letting the Cyclones' other players have big games. Carleton and Middleton accounted for 42 of the team's 60 points and took 36 of the 60 shots, with 6-3 senior Inez Nezerwa (nine points, five rebounds) being the only other player that scored more than four.
            "You know Carleton's going to shoot the majority of their shots and Middleton's going to get her shots up," Mulkey said. "What you can't have happen is that third and fourth player score in double figures and get up a lot of shots."
            Landrum slowed down the Cyclones' train of momentum with a 3-pointer that got Baylor's lead back to double digits. The teams combined to score just nine points in the last 3 ½ minutes.
            Baylor finished with a 22-to-7 assist-to-turnover ratio in winning its 38^thstraight Big 12 regular-season game and 36^thin a row on the road and running its overall winning streak to 17.
            Mulkey and Iowa State coach Bill Fennelly debated the Big 12 Player of the Year award in separate press conferences, with Fennelly saying that "if you're a Big 12 coach and you do not vote for Bridget Carleton for player of the year, you need to call me."
            "I think today, on a national stage, against the best team in our league, there should be no doubt – no doubt – who the player of the year in this league is," Fennelly said.
            Asked if the 6-7 Brown should repeat as the league's player of the year, Mulkey said, "Why would I not think that?"
            "She gets triple-teamed every game. Everybody changes their game plan to play against Baylor because of that kid. If Kalani Brown was standing right there, and another player in this league, who would you take? She's 6-7. So, that's my answer pretty loud and clear."
            The Lady Bears return home to host Texas at 6 p.m. Monday at the Ferrell Center in a game that will be televised by FS1. With West Virginia upset by Oklahoma, Texas took over sole possession of second place with an 81-57 drubbing of Texas Tech.