Baylor
12-0,0-0Big 12
Northwestern State
3-11,0-0Southland
No. 1 MBB Defeats Northwestern State
12/28/2021 9:16:00 PM | Men's Basketball
By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
Knowing that "things change a little bit now" with the start of Big 12 play, top-ranked Baylor made the most of its final tune-up.
Coming off a seven-day Christmas break and playing shorthanded, the Bears (12-0) scored the first 13 points of the game and blew out the visiting Northwestern State Demons, 104-68, Tuesday night at the Ferrell Center behind a career-high 27 points from James Akinjo.
"Coming back from Christmas break, normally teams are rusty, and I thought our guys did a great job in executing throughout," said Baylor head coach Scott Drew, whose team won its national-best 18th game in a row, a school-record 21st-straight at home and 36th-consecutive non-conference game.
"Whenever you score 104 points with 25 assists, nine turnovers, that's really well done. Defensively, we were 39%, which is outstanding. A lot of positives. Now, on to the Big 12. Seven of the top 25 defenses in the Big 12. You don't score 140 often, so things change a little bit now."
The Bears jump into the deep end with a top-10 matchup against No. 8 Iowa State (12-0) in the conference opener for both teams at 1 p.m. New Year's Day in Ames, Iowa.
"Whether it's conference or non-conference, we just want to play as a team and do our best," said freshman Jeremy Sochan, who had his first double-double with 16 points and 11 rebounds in his first start.
Sochan replaced Matthew Mayer, who is in COVID-19 protocol, while sophomore guard LJ Cryer sat out his second-straight game with a nagging foot injury.
"I always say, coaches are concerned about everything," Drew said. "I definitely had confidence in guys stepping up that would take their place. But, at the same time, you always like to go into a game with everybody. Hopefully, we can get all those guys back soon."
It certainly didn't seem to slow down or even faze a Baylor team that hit six of its first shots and went up 13-0 when Akinjo fed Flo Thamba for a bucket. Northwestern State (3-11) missed its first seven shots before Jalen King got loose for a layup 4 ½ minutes into the game.
"I feel like we found the flow very easily," said Adam Flagler, who had his first career double-double with a season-high 21 points and career-best 11 assists. "We have guys that are willing to step up, and we're a deep team, so a lot of guys stepped up today and we just continued to play Baylor basketball."
Fueled by the hot shooting of Akinjo and Flagler, who combined to hit six first-half 3-pointers and score 31 points, the Bears blew out to a 58-30 halftime lead. Baylor shot 55.0% overall and 8-of-18 from outside the arc in the first half.
The Demons, playing their third ranked team and ninth game on the road, kept it as close as they did because of freshman guard Carvell Teasett. He hit five first-half 3-pointers and scored 15 of his team-high 18 points in the first 20 minutes.
Freshman Kendall Brown, who narrowly missed a double-double with 12 points and nine rebounds, had a dunk off an offensive rebound as part of a 9-0 run that pushed the lead to 69-32 in the first 4 ½ minutes of the second half.
"Jeremy did a lot of great things. At the end of the day, him and Kendall continue to get experience and get better," Drew said of the two freshmen. "And they were already good to begin with."
Baylor hit the century mark on a Sochan 3-pointer that stretched the lead to 101-53 with five minutes left in the game. The Bears missed their last 10 shots, including seven from outside the arc, and were outscored, 11-1, over the last 2:45.
"We shot really well for a stretch there, and then at the end we just ran out of gas from 3," Drew said. Baylor still shot 37% from 3-point range (13-of-35), including a combined 8-of-18 by Flagler and Akinjo.
Sochan, who cut off his flowing blond locks and dyed his hair a blueish-green, said when someone gets hot like that, "we're going to look for him. (Akinjo) made those 3's and good for him."
On top of scoring a career-high 27 points, Akinjo was one assist shy of his third career double-double with nine assists to go with five rebounds and four steals. Returning late in the game to try to pick up his 10thassist, Akinjo had a turnover on a lob to Zach Loveday and then missed two 3-pointers before taking a seat.
"He's never had 30 (points). That 30 and 10 was looking good for him," Drew said, "Unfortunately, it didn't happen. . . . Anytime you can have your starting backcourt with 48 points and 20 assists, I think every coach would take that."
