Recap: Baylor 68 Cincinnati 48

In arguably their worst showing of the season, Cincinnati dropped their third consecutive game to open league play in a 68-48 loss at Baylor.

(Photos: Taylor Keeton/ RiverfrontU )

VJ Edgecombe scored 18 points on 7-of-13 shooting and made 2-of-4 from three to help lead the Bears.

Norchad Omier finished with a double-double, scoring 18 points, while pulling down 10 rebounds. 

Scott Drew's team beat the Bearcats in pretty much every way possible, shooting 50% from the field, 36% from three, and 82% from the free throw line on 11 attempts.

Baylor consistently got in the paint when they wanted as Cincinnati struggled to defend the high ball screen. The Bears outscored UC 40-16 in the paint and also out-rebounded Wes Miller's team 29-27. 

"We certainly had discussions on the bench among the coaching staff on a number of things (in-game)," said Miller when asked about defensive adjustments to prevent Baylor from getting in the paint. "Our half-court, man-to-man defense has been the most reliable thing we've had going all year long. I even felt tonight that when we locked in on all five, we felt there would be a breakthrough. Give them credit, they got a handful of baskets in transition and our defense had a lack of effort to get back."

Josh Ojianwuna also reached double figures for Baylor, scoring 10 points, while securing seven rebounds.

Dan Skillings Jr was one-of-two Bearcats to score double figures, finishing with 18 points on 5-of-7 from three-point range. 

The Bearcats poor shooting from the Arizona loss carried over in to the Baylor game, as UC was 8-of-23 from three and 6-of-12 from the free throw line. 

Aziz Bandaogo was the only other Bearcat to reach double figure scoring, contributing 11 points on a perfect 4-of-4 from the field.

Dillon Mitchell was limited to zero points, two rebounds in the loss.

Following another poor performance, Miller was asked how he goes about handling the outside noise of his team potentially being overrated.

"You have two choices. You can either deal with it the right way, which is to pay it absolutely no mind and focus on what we got to do, or you can handle it the wrong way and let it affect you," said Miller. " I can tell you what we're going to do. I'll tell everybody. You can say as many bad things as you want about our team and our players and our coaches and you can say as much of that crap as you want on social media. I ain't going to listen to it. I got no time for it. We're a good team. We will be a good team. We're going to get back to work on doing all the things we have to do to get back on track."

Miller continued.

"We're going to handle that the right way. We ain't going to pay any damn mind to it. That's very difficult for young people in 2024 with the cell phones and all that stuff, but I got a really tough group of kids. I got a high character group of kids. I got no worries about that."

Game Recap:

Baylor won the opening tip and proceeded to score on their first possession of the game as Josh Ojianwuna scored off a feed from Norchad Omier.

Aziz Bandaogo converted two free throws following a Simas Lukosius three to give the Cats an early 5-4 lead.

The Bears responded by making their next four field goal attempts and led 11-9 at 14:21, keyed by five points from Jayden Nunn. 

Norchad Omier's three-point play at 12:21 extended the Baylor lead to 14-9 as Cincinnati was struggling to get anything going offensively and in the midst of a two minute, 43 second scoring drought. 

Day Day Thomas ended an almost four-minute scoring drought at 10:50 to answer a VJ Edgecombe three and trim the Bears' lead to 17-12.

Thomas converted another three on the next Bearcat possession to make the score 19-15 but VJ Edgecombe answered with a three-point play at the other end to extend the BU lead back to seven. 

Dan Skillings' corner three on the next possession cut the Baylor lead back to four (22-18),

With 6:40 remaining in the first half, UC trailed 27-18 as they had no answer for VJ Edgecombe, who was up to 11 points following his second three of the first half. 

At 5:04, UC trailed 31-18 and hadn't scored in 3:04. The Bears were in the midst of a 9-0 run over 2:48 and had made 4-of-5 field goal attempts while UC missed 6-of-7. 

Dan Skillings split a pair of free throw attempts with 1:34 remaining in the half to end a scoring drought that last 6:34.

Baylor missed their final six field goal attempts and did not score during the final 3:07. Despite that, the Bears still led 35-20 at the half as UC scored just one point over the final 8:09.

UC finished the first half 6-of-26 from the field and 4-of-14 from three, making just one of their final ten field goal attempts. 

Dan Skillings made 2-of-3 from three to begin the second half to cut in to the Baylor lead but the Bears continued to get efficient looks at the rim and led 41-28 with 15:27 remaining in the game. 

VJ Edgecombe's three-point play on a foul by Conner Hickman extended the Baylor lead to 50-33. Edgecombe turned a UC turnover on the Bearcats' next possession into a highlight reel dunk at the other end to push the Baylor lead to 19, 52-33, at 10:49 of the second half. 

Baylor's 7-0 run over a span of 1:19 out of the under 12 media timeout gave the home team a 54-33 lead at 9:47 of the second half.

With 8:23 remaining in the game, Baylor had outscored UC 36-8 in the paint and were shooting 55% from the field.

Norchad Omier's three with 7:12 left in the game extended the Baylor lead to 60-37. 

Despite going the next three minutes without a field goal, the Bears still led by 20, 64-44, with 4:10 left in the game. 

Baylor turned  the ball over four times over the final three minutes, but UC managed just four points over the final 4:10 as the Cats walked off the floor with a 68-48 loss.

Final Thoughts:

There's really no excuse for the type of effort and performance that we saw from this Cincinnati team. They are way more talented and a better team than what they have shown through the first three games of Big 12 play.

Guys aren't making shots that they normally make and we aren't seeing the same confidence and swagger that we saw from this team when they dug in to pick up wins over Dayton and Xavier. The intensity just isn't there for the full 40 minutes like it should be. 

The good thing about this league is there is still plenty of time and opportunities to turn things around. That has to start Saturday against Kansas.

Postgame Videos: