The reigning national champions in men’s and women’s basketball square off in a men’s non-conference game Saturday afternoon when No. 9 Baylor hosts Stanford in Waco, Texas.
Baylor (3-0), which won the men’s title last April over Gonzaga, lost its top three scorers from a year ago either to graduation or early entry into the NBA. But that hasn’t prevented the Bears from romping over three outmanned opponents in their quest to repeat.
Stanford (3-1), meanwhile, is better known lately for its strong women’s program. The Cardinal are seeking their first trip to the men’s NCAA Tournament since 2014 despite having seen two of their top three scorers from last season turn pro.
The game is a homecoming of sorts for Stanford’s next NBA prospect, Dallas native Harrison Ingram, who started receiving interest from Baylor during his freshman season at St. Mark’s High.
Now a college freshman, Ingram was Stanford’s leading scorer in each of its first three games, averaging 18.0 points over that stretch, before coasting through a four-point, five-assist effort in a 74-60 blowout home win over Valparaiso on Wednesday.
Ingram has acknowledged that Baylor was among his 10 finalists before he chose Stanford.
“They love my versatility,” he noted of Baylor during the recruiting process, “and think I can come in and make a huge impact right away.”
The Bears didn’t come up empty-handed in the 2021 recruiting wars, luring Kendall Brown from Minnesota. Brown has been Baylor’s second-leading scorer so far with 15.0 points per game.
Baylor has three other consensus Top 100 national recruits among their top four scorers, including returners LJ Cryer (17.7 points) and Matthew Mayer (12.7). They weren’t big contributors to last year’s 28-2 campaign, averaging just 3.4 and 8.1 points, respectively.
The Bears also have added Georgetown transfer James Akinjo, a former prep star in Stanford’s backyard in Oakland. The junior leads Baylor in the early going in assists at 7.0 per game.
Both teams are making a serious rise in class for Saturday’s matchup.
Baylor’s first three opponents — Incarnate Word, Nicholls State and Central Arkansas — went a combined 31-40 last season. None has made an NCAA Tournament appearance since Nicholls State in 1998.
Stanford, meanwhile, lost at Santa Clara in its only previous road game. Its wins have come over Tarleton State, San Jose State and Valparaiso, who went a combined 25-44 last season. Even Santa Clara was just 12-8 a year ago.
Baylor’s Brown assured after his team’s 92-47 romp over Central Arkansas on Wednesday that he and his new teammates plan on playing championship-level defense all season.
“It doesn’t matter who we play; we’re always trying to lock in defensively and to be aggressive,” he said after the Bears recorded 21 steals and forced a total of 29 turnovers against Central Arkansas. “Our motto is to speed them up and have them turn it over.”
–Field Level Media
