No. 7 WBB Dominant in Win over TCU

Wednesday, February 16

7 PM

Baylor

20-5,10-3Big 12

TCU

6-16,2-11Big 12

TCU

Baylor

No. 7 WBB Dominant in Win over TCU

2/16/2022 9:17:00 PM | Women's Basketball

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Bears defeat Horned Frogs 80-55 in the Ferrell Center Wednesday night

By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
            When the Baylor women were sitting at the bottom of the Big 12 standings a little over a month ago, the chances of winning a 12^th-consecutive conference championship seemed faint at best.
            But, with a little help from Texas Tech and Texas, the seventh-ranked Bears (20-5, 10-3) claimed a share of first place with an 80-55 win over TCU Wednesday night at the Ferrell Center.
            "When you start 0-2, you know you're going to need help," said first-year Baylor head coach Nicki Collen, whose team has won five-straight and 10 of its last 11 games. "This puts us back in the driver's seat in terms of controlling our own destiny.
            "Not because we necessarily have the easiest schedule . . . I think we have a tough schedule down the stretch. But, we just have to take care of each game. That's what it's about, going 1-2, not looking past the team in front of us."
            The Bears got the help they needed on Wednesday, when sixth-ranked Iowa State (21-4, 10-3) was blown out by No. 14 Texas, 73-48; and 15^th-ranked Oklahoma (20-5, 9-4) got upset at home by Texas Tech, 97-87. That leaves Baylor tied with the Cyclones and a game up on the Sooners with five games left to play.
            "You can't discount anybody that's in the bottom or in the middle," said senior point guard Jordan Lewis, who scored 10 of her 14 points in the second half, "because anyone could come out on any given night and make crazy shots. You saw tonight, there were a lot of crazy shots that went in, and it could cost you the game. I'm just playing one game at a time and not getting caught up with just the people who are in front of you."
            Queen Egbo and NaLyssa Smith both recorded double-doubles and combined for 42 points as Baylor hit the 20-win mark for the 22^nd-straight year. Egbo had 23 points, 13 rebounds and three blocks, while Smith scored 14 of her 20 points in the second half and had her 45^th career double-double with 10 boards.
            The Bears won a tight rebounding battle, 38-37, scored 14 second-chance points and dominated points in the paint, 48-16.
            "What I'm most proud of is 26 assists (on 32 baskets) and five turnovers," Collen said. "We just didn't turn the basketball over. They obviously weren't crazy aggressive on us. They were in a 2-3 zone most of the night. But it's easy to squeeze passes when you know you want to play through the paint. We did a good job moving the ball and then getting it inside."
            TCU (6-16, 2-11), which lost its eighth in a row, had a one-point lead after the first quarter, trailed by just three at the half and was still within striking distance at 50-47 when Lauren Heard scored on a layup with 2:35 left in the third.
            That's when the Bears took over, ending the quarter on a 9-0 run that included a pair of Smith buckets, a 3-pointer by Ja'Mee Asberry and Sarah Andrews' floater that extended the lead to 59-47. Asberry hit three 3-pointers and scored 11 points, while Andrews scored eight points and matched her career high with nine assists.
            "For pretty much three quarters, we played pretty sound, good basketball," TCU coach Raegan Pebley said, "and (Baylor) went on a bit of a run there and we got a little distracted in it. But, that's part of our growth and our process that we'll embrace and get better."
            In an 11-0 run at the end of the second quarter and 13-straight points extending into the start of the third quarter, Baylor did it on the defensive end of the floor.
            "I think it's getting stops," Collen said. "Players know they've got to compete at the defensive end, and I'm going to get on them harder for defensive mistakes than I am on missing a shot or running a play wrong, which does drive me crazy. When we got rebounds and got out in transition . . . it's easier to post-feed in transition. It's easier to attack gaps in transition."
            Going 9 ½ minutes without a field goal and hitting just one of their last 13 shots, the Horned Frogs were outscored 47-25 in the second half. Heard led the Horned Frogs with 18 points, but was just 7-of-19 from the floor and had five of TCU's 17 turnovers.
            "I don't think we were being as patient at first," Lewis said. "I think every time we got the ball to the middle and got it rotated around, we got easy shots that we knocked down."
            With the game well in-hand, Baylor's bench erupted when freshman walk-on Andrea Katramados hit a 3-pointer from the corner with 28 seconds left for her first points in a Baylor uniform.
            In the second game of a back-to-back, Baylor will play TCU at 1 p.m. Saturday at Schollmaier Arena in Fort Worth.
            "We've got to focus on TCU. And then after TCU, we've got to focus on Oklahoma State," Collen said. "And through all of that, we've just got to focus on us."