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Baylor has picked up right where they left off last season. After registering a 28-2 record before entering the tournament as the No. 1 seed in the South, the Bears rolled to a national championship by upsetting previously undefeated Gonzaga, 86-70, as 4 ½ point neutral-site underdogs.
As of this writing, the Bears are 10-0 and the No. 1 team in the nation after surviving a double-digit scare in Oregon and rallying for a 78-70 victory over the Ducks. Last year Baylor would remain undefeated until they met the Jayhawks in Kansas where they fell, 71-58, and their perfect 18-0 record was abruptly tarnished.
For a while, it appeared as though Baylor’s unblemished record would come to a halt on a Saturday night in December in Eugene when the Bears fell behind by 10 points with less than five minutes remaining in the first half. But there was still far too much time left for the Bears to recoup and go to work. And that is precisely what they did as they began to draw away midway through the second half and ended with an eight-point victory.
"There is pressure at the end of the day — and we have a great group of guys who decided to step forward and take the challenge," said Baylor guard Adam Flagler, who made five three-pointers and finished with 16 points. "It was exciting to go out in the second half and execute and get the win."
Freshman Kendall Brown out of Cottage Grove, Minnesota, tied with James Akinjo as the team leader in points with 17, remarked after the game, "Credit to my teammates. They were telling me to get going and looked for me when I am cutting and running. … Adrenaline takes my bounce to another level. When I am up there, I try to jump my highest."
The oddsmakers are taking note of the Bears as well, and despite Baylor being listed as favorites in every game they have played thus far, they are crushing the bookmakers with an 8-2 ATS (Against The Spread) record. In their last outing, they were listed as 6 ½ to 7-point road favorites and narrowly covered the number much to the delight of their backers.
In their upcoming game on Monday night, they are unlikely to even break a sweat against a bad team from a small conference when they welcome Alcorn State to Waco. And although the Bears are listed as a whopping 34-point favorite, many of the best sports handicappers are including Baylor as part of their NCAAB picks this week. This is the fourth time this season that the Bears have been installed as 30+ point betting favorites and they have covered two of their three previous matchups as such.
Coach K Poised to Leave on Winning Note
After four decades of unprecedented college basketball success, Duke head coach, Mike Krzyzewski, announced in June that this season would be his last. He felt it would be unfair to future recruits to lead them on and then bid farewell to the program that has brought five national championships to the university over 41 years.
After all, many of the top high school hotshots in the nation don’t opt to play at Duke because of its status as one of the leading academic institutions in the nation. They come to play basketball at Durham because they get to toil under the mentorship of one of the games’ greatest tacticians. Perhaps it is more accurately stated that they come to play for Coach K rather than Duke itself.
Krzyzewski made the announcement in a prepared statement, "My family and I view today as a celebration. Our time at both West Point and Duke has been beyond amazing and we are thankful and honored to have led two college programs at world-class institutions for more than four decades. That, coupled with 11 unforgettable years as the United States National Team coach, has resulted in a remarkable journey.”
And what a way for the season to begin for the Blue Devils. They are currently ranked second in the nation with a record of 10-1 and recently dispatched Elon, 87-56, in a game that was supposed to be with Cleveland State, but due to COVID concerns, schedules all over college basketball have been postponed, adjusted or outright canceled. Elon was asked to drop their date with Shaw University to fill the void and they came through for Coach K and took a beating for the privilege.
As the Omicron variant of the novel coronavirus begins to disrupt the world just as we were getting back to some semblance of normal, come the conference matchups. This could be reminiscent of last season when dozens upon dozens of games were impacted. Hopefully, college basketball will navigate through these troubled waters and Duke will be able to finish the season and enter March Madness one final time under the master himself, Coach K.
