By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
            NORMAN, Okla. – Just 2 ½ weeks ago, Baylor beat Oklahoma, 84-74, in a Waco shootout that saw both teams knock down a sizzling 56% from the floor. 
            Saturday, it was Baylor's defense that owned the day. 
            Holding the Sooners (12-7, 2-5) to a season-low 51 points, the fifth-ranked Bears (17-2, 5-2) scored 35 points off OU's 25 turnovers and pulled away with a late 13-2 run to win their fourth-straight conference road game, 65-51, Saturday afternoon at the Lloyd Noble Center. 
            "Schematically, we changed how we did things (defensively)," said Baylor coach Scott Drew, whose team is still unbeaten away from home this season (5-0 road, 3-0 neutral) and a conference-best 18-3 in Big 12 road games over the last three years. 
            "We switched a lot more, stayed with the man on the cuts, made sure we did a better job protecting the paint. And then, I think being a lot more locked into their personnel. The first time we faced them, new staff, a lot of new players. I thought we were a lot better prepared this time around."
            Rallying from double-digit deficits in both halves, Oklahoma made it a one-possession game, 45-42, on a pair of Elijah Harkless free throws with 7:03 left in the game. 
            But, the game took a dramatic turn following James Akinjo's only bucket of the game. The senior point guard scored on a drive to the basket at the 6:37 mark, but fell on his back and appeared to aggravate a tailbone injury that forced him to sit out Tuesday's win at West Virginia. 
            "Purposely, I was trying not to put him in those situations," Drew said, "but we needed a bucket. Unfortunately, he hit the tailbone again. So, we'll keep rehabbing him. It's a bruise, so it's all pain tolerance. It's really painful, but he's a tough kid, too."
            Over the next four minutes, the Sooners turned it over four times and missed two of three shots as Baylor went on a 13-2 run that pretty much put this one away. 
            OU's Tanner Groves was hit with a technical foul when he argued a no-foul call on a play that saw Baylor's Matthew Mayer inadvertently hit him in the face with his right knee. Upon video review, the officials determined that there wasn't a flagrant foul. 
            Making the Sooners pay, LJ Cryer knocked down four-straight free throws to push the lead back to nine, 51-42, with 6:09 left. 
            "Those were really big free throws by LJ," Drew said of Cryer, one of four double-figure scorers for the Bears with 14 points. "It's not always easy making technical (free throws), either, by yourself. It was the first time he as at the line, so those were big free throws."
            Completing the run, Matthew Mayer drained a turn-around 3-pointer, freshman Kendall Brown hit a pair of free throws and Adam Flagler knocked down a jump shot that made it 58-44. 
"They're a really good team," said Flagler, who scored 14 of his game-high 16 points in the second half, "but we knew if we communicated and packed it in tight and didn't let them get to the paint as easy, we could cause turnovers and get out on runs. We just did a great job of executing."
Mayer and Brown chipped in with 12 and 10 points, respectively, while Flo Thamba finished with seven points, 10 boards, three steals and a block in a career-high 28 minutes. 
            "I thought Flo did a great job rolling, first of all," Drew said. "He was just active. Defensively, was really locked into the assignment. Every game's different, and that's why you've got to have different people and more weapons that can come in and contribute when it's not your night. Hopefully, the defense is always constant."
            That Baylor defense held the Sooners scoreless for the first 5 ½ minutes before Harkless ended the drought with a mid-range jumper. The Bears started the game on a 10-0 run on back-to-back dunks by Thamba and Mayer, a three-point play by Brown and a Cryer 3-pointer. 
            "We pride ourselves in starting the game strong and finishing the game strong," Flagler said. "Once it was halftime, we knew it was another opportunity to expand the lead and just try to get out and win the game."
            That double-digit lead disappeared over the next nine minutes as OU answered with a 17-3 run and went up 21-17 on a driving layup by Marvin Johnson with 4:33 left in the half. 
            That's when Baylor's defense took over again. OU had three turnovers and missed its next four shots, going scoreless over the last 4 ½ minutes of the half, as the Bears closed on an 8-0 run to go up 25-21. 
Groves, the Sooners' leading scorer, turned it over twice and didn't even take a shot in a frustrating first half. 
            "Our defensive scheme was basically switching everything," Thamba said. "We noticed in our first game that they had a lot of points in the paint, especially off the roll. Our defense was challenged to switch on everything so that we always had a guy on (Groves)."
            The Bears had an extended 16-0 run, scoring the first eight points of the second half. But, Oklahoma didn't go away quietly. 
            Groves scored all 11 of his points in the second half, including a 3-pointer before Harkless free throws, as the Sooners cut a 14-point deficit down to just three. In the end, though, Baylor had enough to hand OU its fourth-straight loss and fifth in the last six games. 
            "We like this week a lot more than last week," said Drew, referring to the Bears' back-to-back losses at home to Texas Tech and Oklahoma State, snapping a 21-game winning streak.  
            Baylor returns home to host Kansas State (10-8, 2-5) at 7 p.m. Tuesday. Looking for their third-straight win over a ranked team, the Wildcats led seventh-ranked Kansas by 16 at the half in Manhattan, but ultimately fell, 78-75.