No. 18 Bears Find Way Past Scrappy UCF Knights, 77-69

ORLANDO, Florida — The No. 18 Baylor Men’s Basketball team (15-5, 4-3) found a way to get back on track against the pesky, hard-nosed defense of the UCF Knights (12-8, 3-5) with a 77-69win.

Langston Loved put the Bears on his back by racking up 24 points and seven rebounds after the Knights jumped out to an early 18-8 lead in the first five minutes. 

Defensively, Scott Drew’s squad gave up very good shooting performance to UCF, who shot 54% from the field and 14-for-27 from downtown. However, they were able to force 16 turnovers and mix in zone defense to slow the Knights down at key times.

After clawing the score back to 38-32 in favor of the hosts at halftime, Baylor would play a much cleaner second half to grind out the win.

RayJ Dennis guided the green and gold offense to 45 points and only one turnover in the second period. The senior point guard would finish with 11 points and eight assists.

Jalen Bridges and Yves Missi also had solid scoring nights for the Bears with 12 and 11 points respectively. Though, Ja’Kobe Walter may have hit the most timely shot of any of the trio.

Walter knocked down a catch-and-shoot triple to extend what would eventually become a 14-2 Baylor kill-shot run. The open shot came courtesy of great ball movement from Dennis and Bridges.

Scott Drew might still have some tough love for his squad after they let a nine-point lead with under three minutes to play dwindle to just four points with 1:30 left. But after three straight agonizingly close losses, all is well that ends well.

Now the Bears will look to build off of their 45% shooting performance from deep as they come back to Waco for a Saturday showdown against the No. 12 Iowa State Cyclones (16-4, 5-2). That game is set to tip off at 7:00 PM in the Foster Pavilion.