By Kalena Reynolds | Staff Writer
Coming off of five straight conference wins and a recent loss against UCLA, No. 25 Baylor women’s basketball is preparing to take on No. 9 TCU at 2 p.m. Sunday at Schollmaier Arena in Fort Worth.
Following Monday’s non-conference bout, junior forward Darianna Littlepage-Buggs said the Bears (16-4, 6-1) are prepared to use the 72-57 loss against the Bruins as a motivator for the next game and an ability to peek inside the team’s weaknesses.
“I think it’s definitely a lesson learned. We maybe didn’t do so well for this game, so we just took it to the next game and went here and out,” Littlepage-Buggs said. “We do have these next couple games coming up, and we are probably going to get really detailed about what things we could’ve done better and how to, because they have somebody tall, move with them and move the ball and where we could score at.”
The Horned Frogs (19-2, 7-1), who dropped their first Big 12 matchup against Oklahoma State on Wednesday, are looking for the same clarity as the Bears. Baylor aims to rebound from the Bruins game, where UCLA junior center Lauren Betts recorded 24 points, nine rebounds and a career-high nine blocks, against another dominant center.
Horned Frog 6-foot-7 graduate center Sedona Prince currently sits fourth in the Big 12 with 19.1 points per game, third with 9.1 rebounds per game and leads the league averaging 3.5 blocks per game. Over the past two years at TCU, Prince has recorded 21 double-doubles and racked up 20 points and 10 rebounds in the Horned Frogs lone contest against the Bears last season, a 71-50 Baylor win on Jan. 3, 2024.
Prince, who amassed a large following on TikTok, originally made waves across the internet for a monumental lawsuit against the NCAA that helped secure money for college athletes. The case was settled for $2.8 billion and ultimately changed the trajectory of income opportunities for student-athletes.
Prince also made headlines throughout the media in 2024 for physical and verbal abuse as well as cheating allegations against her ex-girlfriend, Olivia Stabile. After Stabile uploaded a 10-part TikTok video series detailing a birthday trip gone bad, rumors circulated about the abuse Prince had inflicted on her ex-girlfriend.
While TCU focuses on gaining momentum after a 10-game winning streak came to a close, UCLA looks to stay undefeated. Both teams matched up with now-No. 2 South Carolina with the Bruins handing the Gamecocks their only loss, a 77-62 affair on Nov. 24, 2024, while the Horned Frogs fell 85-52 on Dec. 12, 2024.
“When I committed to play in this, I didn’t know UCLA was going to be undefeated and No. 1 in the country, and we actually committed to it before they pulled in the haul in the transfer portal. But I think it was an amazing experience for our team to come to New York,” head coach Nicki Collen said.
While UCLA is averaging 82.3 points per game, No. 14 in the nation, TCU comes in just behind them with an average of 81 points per game, No. 18 in the nation. The Bears sit at No. 26 with 79.8 points per game, but with experience against a similar-looking team earlier in the week, the green and gold feel ready for the challenge.
A win against TCU would likely keep Baylor inside the AP Top 25 despite the loss earlier in the week, before a stretch of games against multiple unranked teams. Tipoff is scheduled for 2 p.m. Sunday at Schollmaier Arena in Fort Worth, with the game being broadcast on ESPN2.
