James Akinjo scored 16 points on 6-of-12 shooting, and No. 1 Baylor held on for a 77-72 win over No. 8 Iowa State in a Big 12 matchup Saturday afternoon in Ames, Iowa.
LJ Cryer had 13 points for the Bears and Jeremy Sochan finished with 12 points and a team-high seven rebounds. Baylor (13-0, 1-0 Big 12) won its 19th straight game dating to last season.
The Cyclones’ Tristan Enaruna tallied 23 points on 8-of-11 shooting to lead all scorers. Izaiah Brockington had 18 points and Tyrese Hunter scored 12 for Iowa State (12-1, 0-1).
Baylor shot 50 percent (30 of 60) from the field and 41.2 percent (7 of 17) from beyond the arc. Iowa State shot 47.2 percent (25 of 53) overall but only 7.1 percent (1 of 14) from deep.
The Bears had a 29-12 advantage in points off the bench.
Cryer had five straight points to increase Baylor’s lead to 54-43 with 13:11 remaining. He drained a 3-pointer off an assist from Akinjo, made a steal on Iowa State’s next possession and finished the sequence with a layup.
Iowa State answered with a 6-0 run to close the gap to 54-49 with 11:39 to go. Alijaz Kunc made a pair of free throws, Robert Jones had a basket and Brockington added two more free throws.
The Bears once again withstood the pressure from Iowa State. Baylor built its biggest lead of the game at 14 points when Sochan hit a 3-pointer to make it 70-56 with 5:28 to play.
The Cyclones refused to go away, responding with a 9-0 run to pull within 70-65 with 2:20 left. Enaruna had six consecutive points to start the run.
That was as close as Iowa State would get.
Baylor led 41-33 at the half.
The Cyclones never led. They evened the score at 8-8 on a slam dunk by George Conditt, but Baylor responded with a 22-12 run to pull ahead by double digits.
Matthew Mayer finished the run for Baylor with a tip-in basket, which extended the advantage to 30-20 with 5:04 remaining in the half.
–Field Level Media
