By Marissa Essenburg | Sports Writer
A 90-minute drive, a rivalry like no other and — for the first time in Big 12 women’s basketball history — an ESPN College GameDay–presented matchup. Amid the hype, No. 11 TCU rolled past No. 18 Baylor 65-53 Sunday evening in Fort Worth to seize control of the Big 12 title race.
Although temperatures hovered around 80 degrees outside, it was an ice-cold night inside a sold-out Schollmaier Arena for the Bears (24-7, 13-5 Big 12), as Olivia Miles and Marta Suárez torched Baylor once again, combining for 40 points in a game where Baylor never found its footing and the Horned Frogs (27-4, 15-3 Big 12) led in nearly every category.
“That’s what’s so special about [TCU] is that they have a Batman and a Robin, and you don’t know which is Batman and which is Robin on any given night,” head coach Nicki Collen said. “When one is struggling, the other steps up and vice versa.”
Baylor managed just 15 first-half points, trailing 26-15 at the break after shooting 8% from deep and committing 11 turnovers. Leading scorer Taliah Scott nearly went without a made field goal through three quarters, opening the game with two free throws before finally seeing a shot fall in the closing seconds of the third.
Despite trailing for nearly the entire contest, Baylor refused to fold, finally seeing shots fall as defensive stops began to mount. Scott sparked the rally. The redshirt sophomore guard knocked down consecutive buckets during a seven-point burst over a two-minute stretch, trimming the deficit to 10 with eight minutes remaining.
“I was really proud of our second-half effort, only losing the second half by one,” Collen said. “I thought we competed at a high level. We turned them over and did a lot of good things. It certainly isn’t the feeling we want at the end of the day, but I thought we competed at a high level and turned it into a pretty good basketball game.”
But on Senior Day, it was TCU that protected home court, extending its 41-game home winning streak and securing its second straight Big 12 regular-season crown.
“Disappointment is the biggest motivation, and while we’re all disappointed with how the regular season ended, I think we’re coming out with a new vengeance,” Scott said. “This team is hungry, and we’re all ready to go and step up to whatever challenge we have next week, starting with the conference tournament.”
With the regular season now in the rearview and all eyes turning to the postseason, No. 3-seeded Baylor will head to Kansas City for the Big 12 Tournament, where the Bears will face the winner of a second-round matchup between Colorado and the winner of Kansas and UCF in the quarterfinals. Tipoff is set for 8 p.m. Friday at the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, Mo.
