Baylor
Washington State
No. 11 MBB Returns to Action in Dallas Against Washington State
12/16/2022 9:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
The Bears and Cougars will cap off the USLBM Coast-to-Coast Challenge
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BAYLOR BEARS (7-2) Location: Waco, Texas Conference/Affiliation: Big 12 Head Coach: Scott Drew (Butler, 1993) Roster | Stats | Game Notes (PDF) |
WASHINGTON STATE (4-5) vs. 11/11 BAYLOR (7-2) Dec. 18, 2022 • 9:01 p.m. CT Dallas, Texas • The American Airlines Center (20,000) LIVE STATS: Stat Broadcast WATCH: ESPN+ Talent: Rich Hollenberg (pxp), Fran Fraschilla (analyst) LISTEN: Learfield/ ESPN 1660 AM / 92.3 FM in Central Texas and on the Varsity Network App. Talent: Pat Nunley (PBP), David Kaye (Analyst) SIRIUS XM: Sirius 84, XM 84, Internet 84 Baylor Social Media:    |
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WASHINGTON STATE COUGARS (4-5) Location: Pullman, Wash. Conference/Affiliation: Pac 12 Head Coach: Kyle Smith (Hamilton, 1992) Roster | Stats | Game Notes (PDF) |
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By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
This is the life that most basketball players dream about.
Following an 11-day break for semester final exams, it's all basketball now for 11th-ranked Baylor (7-2). The Bears face Washington State (4-5) at 9 p.m. Sunday in the final game of the Pac-12 Coast-to-Coast Challenge at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.
"Kind of like an NBA schedule, all you've got to do is play basketball," said freshman guard Keyonte George, a potential NBA Draft lottery pick who is averaging 15.7 points and 4.2 assists per game.
"It gives us a lot of time to come together, get in the gym, perfect things that you've been working on throughout the season. It's a blessing that we're able to . . . our main focus is basketball."
Before opening Big 12 play with a New Year's Eve matchup at Iowa State (8-2), Baylor will play three games in the next 11 days. The Bears turn around and host Northwestern State (8-3) on Tuesday and then wrap up pre-conference play against Nicholls (5-6) on Dec. 28.
"(Not having classes) is great, as long as you navigate making sure that business is business," Baylor coach Scott Drew said, "because around the holidays, people tend to think about the exciting Christmas break. We've got to make sure we have business to take care of before that break."
Since getting blitzed for 96 points in a blowout loss at Marquette on Nov. 29, the Bears have given up a combined 120 points in wins over then-No. 14 Gonzaga and Tarleton. With leading scorers LJ Cryer (16.5 ppg) and Adam Flagler (16.1 ppg, 6.1 assists) out, Langston Love and Dale Bonner combined for 32 points in an 80-57 win over Tarleton on Dec. 6.
"I think it just shows how deep we are as a team," said George, who scored a game-high 22 against the Texans. "We had guys like Langston step up, Dale was running the offense. It's just good to see and good for everybody else to see that we have multiple players on the team that can do different things. They don't have to just stick in a box."
Cryer (back pain) and Flagler (illness) both returned to practice this week and "hopefully they'll be ready to go," Drew said. "And hopefully we won't get anyone injured or sick between now and game time."
Baylor, which has won 10 of its last 11 games against Pac-12 teams, faces a Washington State team that opened conference play with back-to-back losses to Oregon and Utah and then lost at UNLV, 74-70, on Dec. 10.
The Cougars are led by junior guards T.J. Bamba (16.7 ppg) and Jabe Mullins (14.2 ppg), who has missed the last four games with a knee injury. Freshman 7-footer Adrame Diongue has sat out three of the last four games with an injury.
"Washington State is a team that's had its share of injuries, a couple season-ending injuries," Drew said. "Their coach (Kyle Smith) has done a great job in getting them to really play analytical basketball, which is finish at the rim or shoot a lot of 3's. It's a team where 1 through 4 really like to shoot the 3, and then Mouhamed Gueye (13.4 ppg, 7.7 rebounds) is really a long, athletic big who has some YouTube dunks and blocks that people like looking at."
The Cougars made a school-record 19 3-pointers in a 96-54 win over Detroit Mercy and hit 13-of-23 treys in the loss to UNLV.
DJ Rodman, the son of five-time NBA champion Dennis Rodman, is a 6-6 senior forward averaging 7.8 points, 5.8 rebounds and a team-high 1.2 steals per game.
"(DJ) is a skilled player, meaning he knows how to play and has a good feel," Drew said. "He passes well, probably shoots it better than his dad, but I'm not saying that."
Baylor-Washington State is the finale of the Pac-12 Coast-to-Coast Challenge that begins with the No. 7 Texas men versus Stanford at 12 p.m., followed by the UT women versus USC at 2:30 p.m. and the 18th-ranked Baylor women facing No. 20/17 Arizona at 6:30.
The game will be broadcast by ESPN2, with Rich Hollenberg and Fran Fraschilla calling the action.
STORY LINES
• No. 11/11 Baylor faces Washington State in the USLBM Pac 12 Coast-to-Coast Challenge.
• The game will be played at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, home of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks, the second of two regular season games in an NBA arena.
• The Bears have won eight of the last 11 games in NBA arenas including each of the last two at the AAC.
• BU is 1-3 all time against Washington State, and the two are meeting for the first time since Dec. 23, 2010.
• The Bears are 10-1 against their last 11 Pac 12 opponents, with wins in each of the last 6 meetings.
• BU is 41-10 in road/neutral venues over the last four seasons.
• The Bears are the 5th best offense in the nation according to Ken Pom (116.4 Adj. Efficiency rating), averaging 85.1 points per game.
• Baylor is 24-7 against AP top 25 teams over the last four seasons, the nation's best mark against ranked teams. 15 of those wins came against top 25 teams away from home.
• With its 62nd consecutive week in the AP Top 25, Baylor has the nations second-longest streak (Gonzaga 120).
• The 12th-ranked Bears spent a school record 54-straight weeks top-10 ranked in the AP Poll (12/19/19 -12/5/22).
• Down its two leading scorers, Langston Love and Keyonte George went for 20+ points each to lift the Bears past Tarleton (12/6).
• BU held the nation's best offense in Gonzaga, to a season-low 63 points in a 64-63 win in the inaugural Peacock Classic (12/2).
• LJ Cryer set career highs in points (28), field goals (10), rebounds (4) and minutes (35) against No. 8 UCLA (11/20).
• Cryer's 23.5 points per game in Las Vegas earned his first-career Big 12 Player of the Week Award.
• Baylor has had at least one player score 20+ points in seven of the last 10 games.
• Adam Flagler and Keyonte George have three 20-point games in that stretch, followed by Cryer (2), Jalen Bridges (1), and Love (1).
• With a 95-62 win over Northern Colorado (11/14), Scott Drew became one of 10 active coaches with 400+ wins at his current institution.
• Drew has a winning percentage of .700 (369-155) since BU's first year with no scholarship restrictions in 2007-08.
• In his 20th season at BU, Drew is coming off Big 12 Coach of the Year honors for a 3rd-straight season, joining Gene Keady (Purdue, 94-96) and Jay Wright (Villanova, 14-16) as the only high-major coaches to accomplish the feat.
• Baylor is 43-5 vs. unranked teams over the last three seasons.
• With a 117-53 win in the season opener against Mississippi Valley State (11/7), BU notched the third-largest margin of victory in program history, and 117 points were 1 shy of a Ferrell Center record.
• In an 87-70 win over Norfolk State, BU shot 38 three-pointers, the second-most in the Scott Drew era and the fifth-most in school history.
• Baylor has been in the Preseason AP Top 25 in 10 of 13 seasons since its first preseason ranking in 2010-11.
• The Bears are 63-11 over the last three seasons, the nation's best record by a Power-5 team.
• Baylor is playing its 629th game of the 20-year Drew era – more than half (320) have been as a ranked team.
