By Dylan Fink | Sports Writer
Wednesday night saw a scrap of familiar faces in Cincinnati, Ohio, as former Bearcat senior forward Dan Skillings was welcomed with boos while former sixth-year forward Jalen Celestine, a former Bear, dawned the red and black to face his previous team.
Baylor was embarrassingly routed 67-57, marking its seventh conference loss so far this season.
The Bears (11-9, 1-7 Big 12) fell behind from the get-go as Cincinnati (11-10, 3-5 Big 12) scored the first bucket immediately off the tip with a rim rattling alley-oop. Outside of a brief 10-0 run Baylor was playing from behind for a majority of the first half.
Head coach Scott Drew’s squad struggled to find the bottom of the bucket, shooting 35% from the floor in the first half and went 5-of-9 from the free-throw line on the game.
Cincinnati’s star guards Jizzle James and Day Day Thomas went 0-10 from three in the team’s previous two games, but the pair went a combined 4-7 in the first half.
The Bears entered the half trailing 35-28 due to their shooting woes.
Searching to find a run to turn around their poor shotmaking, the Bears fell back into a rut begin the second half. Cincinnati began the half on a 10-2 run, once again putting the Bears behind by double-digits.
Redshirt sophomore Cameron Carr, who has been the leading scorer for the Bears this season averaging 20.4 points per game, missed his first six shots Wednesday night. Carr remained scoreless into the second half before scoring with 12 minutes to go.
At the nine-minute mark Baylor trailed by 13 before the poor streak furthered as Skillings, already struggling in his return home, received a Flagrant 1 foul at the eighth minute after shoving Celestine.
As quick as they could blink, the Bears went from a seven point deficit to 18. Leading the fight for the Bearcats was senior forward Baba Miller, who picked up an 18 points and 17 rebound double-double.
Any game plan Baylor may have had at any point in the game vanished in the final five minutes as the Bears trusted Carr with the ball until the final buzzer sounded.
The Bears dropped their fourth straight game and seventh in conference play. This is the worst Big 12 stretch for the Bears since the 2004-05 season, marking almost no chance of turnaround for the team on the season.
Baylor was led by freshman Tounde Yessoufou with 16 points on 6-for-14 shooting from the field.
The Bears will tip off next against West Virginia (14-7, 5-3 Big 12) at 3 p.m. Saturday at Hope Coliseum and will be broadcast on ESPN2.
