Baylor
22-1,13-1Big 12
Kansas State
9-20,4-14Big 12
No. 2 MBB Grinds Out 74-68 Win over Kansas State
3/11/2021 4:10:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Bears advance to face Oklahoma State in Big 12 Tournament Semifinals
By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – This was clearly not the same Kansas State team that second-ranked Baylor blew out twice by 40 points per game over a 40-day stretch in December and January.
Led by freshmen Nijel Pack and Davion Bradford, the ninth-seeded Wildcats (9-20) forced 21 turnovers, shot 40 percent from outside the arc and actually beat the Bears on the offensive glass (13-8) to stay in this one till the end.
But ultimately, Baylor's backcourt trio of MaCio Teague, Davion Mitchell and Jared Butler were simply too much, combining for 65 points in the Bears' 74-68 win in Thursday's Big 12 Championship quarterfinal at T-Mobile Center.
"You'd love to be able to do what we did our first two games," said Baylor coach Scott Drew, whose team improved to 22-1, matching the best 23-game start in program history, "but I knew personally coming in that you're not beating a Coach (Bruce) Weber team three times like that. . . . They're really dangerous when you don't have a lot of prep time, because they can make you look bad. And they did on several of their sets."
After building 29- and 28-point halftime leads in the first two meetings, Baylor turned it over 13 times in the first half of Thursday's game and limped to intermission up by just two, 36-34. The Bears couldn't contain the 7-foot Bradford, who scored 15 of his 18 points in the first half and made 5-of-6 from the floor.
Baylor's defense cleaned that up in the second half, holding Bradford to just three points and 1-of-3 shooting from the floor, but Pack took up the slack and drained five of his six 3-pointers after a quiet first half.
"I think our defensive intensity really picked up," Drew said of holding the Wildcats to 10-of-28 shooting in the second half and defending the pick-and-roll plays better. "We got a lot more physical and tried to contest things. Credit K-State. First half, I thought they executed their offense at a fast clip, and we were a step behind on a lot of it."
Maybe even more surprising than the Wildcats being able to stay in the game was Butler and Mitchell combining for 13 of Baylor's 21 turnovers. In the Bears' 100-69 win on Dec. 19 in Manhattan, Kan., Butler had 13 assists and only one turnover, but he had five turnovers in the first half alone and seven for the game.
"They had a great defensive game plan. I thought they forced us into some of those turnovers," Drew said. "Obviously, 13 turnovers from our (two point guards) is something that never . . . it hasn't happened much. And as coaches, we've got to do a better job preparing them to make sure they know exactly where their reads are."
K-State, which never led in either of the previous two games, went up by one on back-to-back 3-pointers by Pack in the first two minutes of the second half. But, the Wildcats missed three shots and turned it over twice as Baylor answered with a 10-2 run and never trailed the rest of the way.
Teague scored the first seven points in the run with a pair of floaters and a three-point play on a layup and follow free throw, then Mitchell capped it with a 3-pointer off a dish from Mark Vital that gave the Bears a 51-44 lead with 13:19 left in the game. Vital had a season-high six assists and recorded double-digit rebounds for the 17th time in his career with 10 boards.
"We just got out in transition, that was the biggest thing," said Teague, who scored 16 of his game-high 24 points in the second half. "It just happened to be me. Tomorrow, it might be (Adam Flagler), Mark (Vital), Jared (Butler), somebody else. We've just got to get stops and get out in transition."
Pack hit two more 3-pointers that got K-State back within 55-52 at the midway point of the second half, but the Bears answered again and took their biggest lead of the day, 68-56, when Flo Thamba finished off a nifty move to the hoop with a dunk.
"There were several times where I thought, 'God, we're in trouble,''' Weber said, "and you'd get (behind by) 9, and then all of a sudden, it's back to 3 or 4 or whatever. Seemed like every time something went against us, our guys responded and found a way to make a play."
Whittling it back down to a four-point deficit on Pack's final 3-pointer, the Wildcats had a chance to make things even more interesting in the last 30 seconds. But, Butler iced it with a pair of free throws with 19.7 seconds left after Pack coughed it up trying to draw a three-shot foul on a bump by Flagler well beyond the 3-point line.
Surviving and advancing, Baylor makes its first Big 12 Championship semifinal since 2016 and will face 12th-ranked and fifth-seeded Oklahoma State (19-7) at 5:30 p.m. Friday. Avery Anderson III and Cade Cunningham scored 17 points apiece in the Cowboys' 72-69 win over fourth-seeded and 10th-ranked West Virginia.
The Bears swept the season series, but this will be the first time Cunningham and Isaac Likekele will both be available in the same game. Cunningham hit four 3-pointers and scored 24 points in Baylor's 81-70 win over the Cowboys in last week's game at the Ferrell Center.
"We usually prepare for both of them to play," said Mitchell, who had his third-straight 20-point game against K-State, averaging 24.7 points in the three games. "We never prepare for just one of them to play, it's just usually what happens. So, we'll just stick to our game plan and hope everything works out."
