By Michael Haag | Sports Editor
Three of No. 14 Baylor men’s basketball’s guards combined for 62 points as the Bears took down the University of Oklahoma 82-72 Wednesday night in the Ferrell Center.
Freshman guard Keyonte George led the way with 23 points, redshirt senior guard Adam Flagler followed with 20 and redshirt freshman Langston Love had 19 off the bench.
Kenneth Prabhakar | Photo Editor
Baylor won its fifth conference game this season when winning the turnover battle. In Big 12 games that the Bears commit an equal or greater number of turnovers to their opponents, they’re 2-4.
“Coach Drew has done a good job of enforcing taking care of the ball,” George said. “Early on, we were turning the ball over and giving up points in transition. First, we emphasized getting back and now we’re emphasizing playing on two feet with two hands. Stay ball-strong and look for your teammates then. It starts in practice and now the results are showing on the camera and in the games. It’s cool to see that finally coming all together.”
Kenneth Prabhakar | Photo Editor
Baylor (18-6, 7-4 Big 12) only suffered seven turnovers to Oklahoma’s (12-12, 2-9 Big 12) 14.
Head coach Scott Drew said he’ll take any win he can get it in this league.
“Getting a win is all that matters in the Big 12,” Drew said. “So good, bad, ugly, you can play well and get losses in this league. Winning is what matters most. It was great.”
George scored eight of the team’s 11 points in the first 3:30 of action to put Baylor up by four. He hit another jumper at the 10:39 mark to extend the Bears’ lead to 23-16. Oklahoma never wavered and cut its deficit back to four in less than two minutes.
Love scored two buckets in the last two minutes of the half to give Baylor a nine-point lead, its biggest of the game. The Sooners’ freshman guard Milos Uzan sank a buzzer-beating 3-pointer to make it 41-35 going into the break.
“Langston was really efficient, everything but the free throw line,” Drew said. “Other than that, he really stepped up and did a great job today. That’s why you’ve got to have depth, because every day is not your day.”
Junior guard LJ Cryer left the game in the first half and never returned. Drew told reporters after the game that it was a foot injury and that Cryer’s status was unknown. He also said that forward Caleb Lohner is battling a foot injury, too.
“I think we’ll get a couple of pedicures to get people right,” Drew said.
Oklahoma outscored Baylor 13-4 in the first six minutes of the second half to take a one-point lead. But, a pair of 3-pointers from redshirt senior forward Jonathan Tchamwa Tchatchoua helped the Bears regain their cushion at 61-54 with 8:33 remaining.
“Basketball’s a game of runs, so we knew they were gonna make their run and we just had to give our best counter for it,” Love said. “And that’s what we did. As soon as we got the lead, we just didn’t want to give it up again and just really tried to hone in on the defensive end just to win the game.”
OU kept it close until the 5:01 mark when Love sank a triple to put the Bears up by seven. The Sooners were unable to trim the deficit to anything within striking distance, and the Bears pulled away 82-72.
Regarding his 19-point outing, Love said he wasn’t focused on Cryer being out or anything else. He said he didn’t need added motivation to perform at a high level.
“I just go with the flow,” Love said. “Basketball is up and down. People are going to be out, people are going to be in. As a team, we just have to have each other’s backs and just keep pushing together.”
With the win, the Bears are now a single game out of first place in the conference standings.
Baylor now heads north to face No. 17 Texas Christian University on Saturday in Fort Worth at 3 p.m. on ESPN2.
