FINALLY DEFEATED
Bears drop first game of season, but coach still optimistic for deep NCAA Tournament run
Kansas hands Baylor first loss, puts Bears’ plans of Big 12 title on hold.
Eternal optimism has long been a Scott Drew staple.
“You could say one is a fluke,” a buoyant Drew said following his second Big 12 win as Baylor’s coach in February 2004. “A second one shows we’re getting better. We’re improving.”
The Bears’ win over Texas A&M 17 years ago this month in the Ferrell Center came against six losses to that point in league play, but Drew was right: The Bears already were improving following his hire from Valparaiso and immediately after the scandalous Dave Bliss era in Waco.
No. 2 Baylor, long removed from enthusiastic mediocrity, on Saturday night had a chance to win its first conference title since 1950, but No. 17 Kansas put the Bears’ plans on hold with a 71-58 Jayhawks victory at Allen Fieldhouse.
Following its first setback of the season, Baylor (18-1, 10-1 Big 12) will get three more chances against West Virginia, Oklahoma State and Texas Tech to clinch a title.
“Winning the conference championship is a goal, but it’s not the end goal,” Drew said. “We’ve got March Madness coming up and a chance to do some things that we haven’t done in the school’s history in quite some time.
“The Big 12 regular season and the conference tournament are not the end of it.”
Drew hopes, anyway. A year ago the Bears were flying high, as well and were ranked fifth nationally when the season was canceled during the Big 12 tournament because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
That team had a decent
shot at winning the first national title in Baylor men’s basketball history. So does this one, with a balanced attack prompting Kansas coach Bill Self, not one to typically gush over opponents, to dub the Bears “terrific” four times in one statement before Saturday’s action.
“This year’s version is definitely one of the best teams we’ve faced in my time here at Kansas, regardless of where we play them,” Self said. “They have a terrific team — a terrific team, terrific personnel, they’re wellcoached, they’ve got a lot of
terrific pieces.”
Baylor led the entire first meeting against Kansas on Jan. 18 in Waco, with a 16point bulge at one point in a 77-69 victory. The Bears are 10-2 against ranked teams this season and last season, and were the first program to win 10 of 11 against the Top 25 since Indiana from 197476.
The frustrated Bears, who looked out of sorts against the improving Jayhawks (18-8, 12-6), didn’t play for 20 days this month because of COVID-19 issues within the program, coupled with the record-setting
arctic blast that swept across the state in the middle of the month.
“We’ve seen two things that are supposedly once every 100 years,” Drew said of the ongoing pandemic and the freeze that brought a temperature of minus-1 Fahrenheit to Waco, coldest on record in a February. “Hopefully this is a once in a 100-type season that happens a lot more after this.
“Our guys have been really positive all year long, and have controlled what they can control.”
The Bears, typically led by star guard Jared Butler
who had a rare off night Saturday, have plenty of reasons for positivity, despite their first loss. They won their first 17 games this season by eight or more points, becoming the first program to do so since the 1990-91 UNLV squad.
Baylor’s streak was snapped in the Bears’ 77-72 victory over Iowa State on Tuesday in Waco. Baylor trailed the woebegone Cyclones by 17 points in the first half before getting its act together over the final 20 minutes — something the Bears failed to do at Kansas.
“Does three weeks off affect your play? One-hundred percent,” Drew said. “I’ve talked to a lot of coaches who’ve had long pauses. … They say it’s three games until you’re normal, minimum.”
Guard MaCio Teague described the Bears’ return to their early fluidity as a “process” in their final swing toward postseason.
“Playing in a game is way different than practicing five-on-five,” Teague said. “No matter how hard the workout is, no matter how much you get up and down the floor, simulating a game is really hard to do.”
Baylor’s lone appearance in a national title game occurred in 1948, a 58-42 loss to Kentucky. The Bears haven’t made the Final Four since 1950 — also marking their last league title. Drew, 50, has two Elite Eight appearances and four Sweet 16 showings over his 18 seasons, at what was once one of the Big 12’s worst programs.
“The job he’s done over … 18 years at Baylor is probably one of the best coaching jobs ever,” Iowa State coach Steve Prohm said. “The level that he has sustained success there is incredible.”