Bears Embrace Bounce-Back Mindset After Loss, Ready for Upcoming Battle against OSU

Following Baylor’s last-second loss to Arizona State, 27-24, over the weekend, the Bears are finding themselves in a similar situation to last year, but they aren’t letting the winless start to open conference play crush their spirits. 

“The vibes are good,” senior safety Devyn Bobby said on Tuesday. “The vibes are high right now. We’ve got a bounce-back mentality, so we’ve moved on from that, and we’re focused on Oklahoma State.”

Senior wide receiver Kobe Prentice added, “It’s a lot to learn from. We put a lot of good stuff on film. Defense played well. We made some mistakes on offense. We just watched the film. Move on. Worry about Oklahoma State.”

Defensively, Baylor had its best performance of the year, holding Arizona State to 3.7 yards per carry and forcing several field goals in the red zone. On the flip side, the Bears still have a lot to improve on; they dropped a few interceptions, and a busted coverage on third and long in the fourth quarter allowed a 61-yard play for the Sun Devils.

“We didn’t get the win, so we’ve got to get better,” Bobby said. “Somebody said we had a great game, but we didn’t get the win, so we could have had more stops, more turnovers. We’re still having an attack every day mindset, and we’re trying to get better.”

The Sun Devils played a bend-don’t-break defense to keep everything in front of them and forced Baylor’s offense to beat itself, which it did. The Bears had three turnovers, turned the ball over on downs in the red zone and had several drives stall in the third quarter.

“That’s football at the end of the day,” Prentice said. “If they want to play back, we’ll take what they give us. It’s really nothing crazy to it. Just playing football and taking what the defense gives you.”

Against Arizona State, Baylor’s star wide receiver Josh Cameron had an uncharacteristically poor performance, fumbling twice, and a miscommunication between him and quarterback Sawyer Robertson led to an interception. This week, however, Cameron has brushed off the bad outing and is looking to bounce back.

“He didn’t need us to lift him up,” Prentice said of Cameron. “If you watch him in practice, we do ball security drills. He’s never played around with no drill or anything like that. He’s the one telling us to take it seriously. No one’s really concerned about Josh’s character.”

Baylor also received strong performances from redshirt sophomore safeties Jacob Redding and Tyler Turner, who both came up with big pass break-ups and combined for five tackles. If those two continue to improve, that could be a big plus for Dave Aranda’s defense moving forward.

“It’s really good to see those young guys out there making plays,” Bobby said of Redding and Turner. “They’re getting the defense down and helping our program.”

On the first drive for Baylor’s defense, senior linebacker and FIU transfer Travion Barnes went down with a serious leg injury. Before being carted off, he screamed words of encouragement to his teammates.

“Seeing him go down really hurt us,” Bobby said of Barnes. “We’ve been through everything with him since he got here. To see him go out like that really hurt. Now, it’s next-man-up mentality, and we’re all playing for him.”

With what appears to be a manageable schedule ahead, even with a loss in the conference opener, everything the Bears want to accomplish is still ahead of them, and that’s something Aranda is preaching to his team, similar to last year.

“There’s a lot of football left to be played,” Prentice noted. “Nobody’s really worried about last week or even Week 1 against Auburn. We’ve all moved forward. Moving forward allows us to kind of see who’s really for us and lock arms and just play for each other.”

With a trip to Stillwater slated up next, the Bears aren’t overlooking the struggling Pokes, who have started the season 1-2 and fired long-time head coach Mike Gundy on Tuesday.

“It’s the same thing we always talk about — respect all, fear none,” Bobby noted. “We take that into every week. They’re still a great program. They have a great coaching staff and great athletes on the field. We’ve got to be prepared and ready for them.”

Baylor (2-2, 0-1) will face off against the Oklahoma State Cowboys (1-2) on Saturday, Sept. 27, at 2:30 p.m. at Boone Pickens Stadium. The game will be nationally televised on ESPN2.