Alcorn St. @ Baylor preview
Ferrell Center
Last Meeting ( Nov 17, 2017 ) Alcorn St. 61, Baylor 78
No. 2 Baylor will return to the floor for the second time in a less than 24 hours and off a dominating victory when it hosts Alcorn State on Wednesday afternoon in Waco, Texas.
The Bears (7-0) remained unbeaten via an easy 93-56 home win over Central Arkansas on Tuesday. That game was just the third for Baylor since Dec. 9 and was the first in a stretch of three games in five days for the Bears.
Alcorn State (0-4) heads to Waco after an 87-59 loss at Vanderbilt on Monday. Wednesday's game, which was added to the schedule on Dec. 22, will be the Braves' fourth in 11 days, all on the road.
MaCio Teague scored 20 points to lead four teammates in double-figure scoring in Tuesday's victory over Central Arkansas. The game was decided with a 10-0 run that began at the 11:08 mark of the first half and allowed Baylor to expand its early lead to 30-15 and the Bears never looked back.
Central Arkansas never got closer than 15 points over the game's final 21 minutes. The Bears put to rest any notion of a Central Arkansas comeback with a 15-0 run to start the second half, sprinting away to a 68-35 lead with 13:36 to play and waltzing to the final buzzer.
Baylor has scored at least 80 points in each of its first seven games, the first time the Bears have done that since 2014.
"We have experienced guys, guys who've been through battles, and we have a measure of maturity," Baylor coach Scott Drew said. "When you have experienced players normally you can handle the highs and lows a little bit better.
"Every team goes through stuff, and the ones that handle that best are the most successful."
Alcorn State's first four games have been against UAB, then-No. 6 Houston, Liberty and Vanderbilt. Between their opener in Birmingham on Nov. 25 and the loss Monday in Nashville, the Braves had six games canceled because of COVID-19 issues in the Alcorn State program.
Jacoby Ross, playing in his first game of the year, paced Alcorn State with 14 points in the loss to Vanderbilt. Tyree Corbett added a season-high 12 points and 12 rebounds to record the Braves' first double-double of the campaign.
"I believe we are going to be competitive moving forward," Alcorn State coach Landon Bussie said. "We need to become a better rebounding team."
Alcorn State's scheduled Southwestern Athletic Conference home opener set for Jan. 2 against Texas Southern has been postponed due to a positive COVID-19 test and subsequent quarantining of student-athletes among the Texas Southern program.
--Field Level Media