By Jackson Posey | Sports Writer
Amidst a flurry of foul trouble and despite a career night from freshman guard Robert O. Wright III, No. 15 Baylor lost its Big 12-Big East Challenge game against No. 25 UConn, 76-72, Wednesday night at Gampel Pavilion in Storrs, Conn.
“We’re progressing as a team,” Baylor head coach Scott Drew said after the loss. “Why we played this schedule was to prepare us for Big 12 play. And again, these kind of games don’t hurt you [in NCAA Tournament seeding] if you lose, and if you win, it’s a great game. And as a coach you wanna play against the best, and UConn’s been the best the past two years.”
Wright put on a banner performance for the Bears, scoring a career-high 22 points on 9-of-14 shooting. Junior center Josh Ojianwuna made history too, securing a career-high 14 rebounds. But Baylor (5-3) couldn’t overcome significant foul trouble, as fifth-year forwards Norchad Omier and Jalen Celestine fouled out and were nearly joined on the bench by redshirt junior Langston Love and Ojianwuna, who finished with four fouls apiece. The Huskies won the free throw battle by 14 points.
“I thought it was a hard-fought game,” Drew said. “Both teams wanted to win. Both teams executed fairly well. But for us, coming in here, you’re not going to win a close game going 12-for-19 from the free-throw line, shooting 63%. One-, two-possession games, at the end of the day, you gotta make your free throws.”
Both teams entered the game missing key contributors. UConn’s leading scorer and lone returning starter, Alex Karaban, missed his second consecutive game in concussion protocol. On the other side, athletic Baylor freshman wing VJ Edgecombe — who presumably would’ve guarded Karaban, had both been healthy — was a late scratch with a hamstring issue. Fifth-year guard Jeremy Roach also left the game with an injury.
Omier woke up the scoreboard with a spinning, fadeaway jumper just inside the free-throw line, turning over his left shoulder and hitting nothing but net. The Miami transfer played 31 minutes before ultimately fouling out, recording 14 points and seven rebounds in the process. Baylor won his minutes by two points.
Love earned his third career start in Edgecombe’s stead. He jumped out to a quick start, scoring five straight after the first media timeout to spark a 10-0 Baylor run that featured multiple blocked jumpers by the Bears, who led 19-8. After returning to action less than two weeks ago, Love finished with a season-high 16 points on 6-of-12 shooting in 36 minutes, a career-high for a non-overtime game.
“It feels good, just trying to work every day to get the rhythm back,” Love said earlier this week. “I think they said it was like 270 days or something like that, and it was unexpected 270 days. So, it’s just a blessing just to be able to step foot out there again.”
The Huskies quickly answered back with a 10-2 run of their own, fueled by a pair of 3-pointers from St. Mary’s transfer Aidan Mahaney, who eclipsed the 1,000 career point mark on a buzzer-beating set shot off a baseline out-of-bounds play. After a slow start, UConn (6-3) took the lead with a 9-0 run late in the half, before a go-ahead layup by Roach sent the Bears to halftime up 37-36.
The battle of former Montverde Academy teammates Wright III and Huskies freshman forward Liam McNeeley provided much-needed scoring boosts for their respective teams. The five-star freshmen combined for 29 points, with McNeeley’s eight rebounds and three blocks proving critical in a winning effort.
“We had talked about it since we graduated because we knew that game was scheduled,” Wright said. “So, I’m kinda upset we lost and he gets to talk about that one. [He’ll] probably call me later in the week about it. But, just glad we got to fight against each other.
UConn spent much of the second half holding a lead — a lead which spiked as high as seven and all but evaporated as Love and Jayden Nunn hit back-to-back jumpers to pull back within two. The Huskies had seven more points off turnovers than the Bears, and six more on free throws, but entered the final four minutes with a 64-62 lead.
UConn’s Samson Johnson fouled out with under two minutes remaining, just after Omier drew his fourth whistle. Ojianwuna drew a foul, hitting one of two free throws to bring it within four. A flubbed Husky pass ricocheted out of bounds, giving the Bears another chance at it. Ojianwuna corralled an errant 3-pointer from Love — and threw the exit pass into the awaiting arms of UConn’s Jaylin Stewart.
Huskies head coach Dan Hurley called a timeout with 1:07 remaining, his Huskies leading 68-64. The two-time national championship-winning coach has drawn fire in recent weeks for his emotive responses to referees, but his team played composed down the stretch. The Huskies ran 17 more seconds off the clock before eventually ceding a foul on Solo Ball, who converted both free throws.
Wright sprinted down the other way, answering Ball with a quick layup on the other end. The teams scrabbled over a loose ball on the left sideline, but full-court press efforts ultimately failed to produce a turnover. After the clock stoppage, Baylor allowed a clean sideline inbounds pass and allowed Hassan Diara to dribble for eight seconds before deciding to foul.
Diara hit the second free throw; Wright hit a no-look reverse layup six seconds later. Up three points with 16.7 seconds remaining, Stewart and Wright got tangled up on the inbounds play. Wright fell, as Stewart escaped up the left wing. The sophomore wing hit both free throws to extend the lead to 73-68.
Wright missed his third attempt at a sprinting layup, but McNeeley fell out of bounds with the rebound, breathing a final blast of hope into the Bears. Omier caught the inbounds pass on the block, went up strong for an and-one and sank the money shot. He then fouled out to send the Huskies back to the line. With 5.9 seconds remaining and Diara at the line, UConn led 73-70.
Diara missed his first — and made the second.
Wright hit a final full-court, buzzer-beating layup with 0.7 seconds left, and a review with zeroes on the clock judged the Bears to have fouled with 0.4 seconds remaining. This time, Diara sunk both, cementing a 76-72 bounce-back victory for the two-time defending national champions.
“UConn’s won a couple championships, we’ve won a championship, and one thing no one ever talks about in those runs is, you usually gotta get a couple breaks,” Drew said. “The biggest break is, you gotta be healthy enough to develop, and we’ve been bit with the injury bug from [that] standpoint. We’re under five practices as a team together, and it frustrates the heck out of me as a coach because I think we could be really good. But if you can’t practice together, you can’t expect execution, and you can’t expect to be at your best.”
The loss drops the Bears to 5-3, including a 2-3 mark against ranked opponents. They’ll play three more games against mid-major teams before kicking off Big 12 play with a home tilt against Utah on Dec. 31.
