Kerwin Roach scores 21 points as Texas uses big first half to beat Baylor by 12.
AUSTIN — A soon as the media timeout arrived, Shaka Smart strutted onto the court and pumped his fist as if he were Tiger Woods draining a 30-foot birdie putt at the Masters.
The Texas coach beamed and directed his gaze at sophomore point guard Matt Coleman, orchestrator of a brilliant fast break that led to an and-one layup for forward Jericho Sims. The moment came in the midst of a second-half stretch during which Texas made former Big 12 co-leader Baylor look helpless.
Texas (13-10, 5-5 Big 12) dominated this battle of I-35. Its 84-72 win (15-7, 6-3) Wednesday at the Erwin Center snapped the Bears’ sixgame winning streak and further muddled the conference standings.
“They punched us, and we didn’t punch back and that’s the difference,” Baylor guard Jared Butler said.
Texas planned to exploit Baylor’s weak interior defense early and often. Freshman guard Courtney Ramey took Smart’s message to heart.
Ramey’s first lob looked set to sail a few rows deep, right into the face of an unassuming Texas Longhorn Band tubist situated behind the basket.
It didn’t. Instead, the ball wound up in the hands of Texas freshman Jaxson Hayes.
The 6-foot-11 freshman stretched his arms to their breaking point, corralled the ball near the top of the box and hammered home a two-handed dunk.
It was one high-percentage make among a first-half flurry.
Texas shot 60 percent in the period and hit 13 of 19 free throws after drawing the Bears into early foul trouble. Its defense was almost as good. Coleman tracked and hounded Baylor leading scorer Makai Mason, fresh off a 40-point performance against TCU. The senior Yale transfer was somewhat hobbled by a foot injury and finished with a season-low five points on 1of-7 shooting and three turnovers.
With Mason unable to gain separation or create clean looks from behind the arc, the Bears struggled to convert shots.
Texas turned those misses into quick opportunities by pushing the pace off defensive rebounds. It built a 15-point halftime lead on the strength of quality paint touches and crisp ball movement.
The Bears battled back early in the second half and narrowed the gap to eight as guards King McClure and Butler found a few cracks in a steel-trap defense.
Sophomore guard Jase Febres stepped in to stop any thoughts of a Baylor comeback. He sank backto-back 3-pointers off a pair of slick feeds from Ramey.
“They played with nothing to lose and great aggressiveness,” Smart said of Baylor, “but I thought our guys responded really well.”
Texas led for all but 31 seconds, and Baylor never got closer than 12 over the final 11:20.
“The message this last month has been just play hard for 40 minutes,” senior guard Kerwin Roach II said. “It was just a 40minute game.”
Roach paced Texas with an efficient 21 points on nine shots. Coleman finished with 18, six rebounds and five assists.
The question now for Texas is, can it bottle this energy and take it on the road? It has dropped five straight games and will face West Virginia in Morgantown on Saturday.
The Mountaineers sit at the bottom of the Big 12 standings, but their sole conference wins came at home over Kansas and Oklahoma. There’s no such thing as a gimme in this conference.
“Right now, it’s crunch time,” Coleman said. “We know how important road wins are, we know how all wins are. We want to grab all of those. We’ve got eight games left, and it’s wide open, there for the taking.”