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PROVO — BYU basketball's first trip to the banks of the Brazos River dug the Cougars into an 0-2 hole to start conference play.
Jalen Bridges poured in 25 points, five rebounds and two assists, and Ja'Kobe Walter added 16 points as No. 14 Baylor pulled away from the 18th-ranked Cougars 81-72 at the newly opened Foster Pavilion in Waco, Texas.
Langston Love added 15 points and four rebounds for the Bears (13-2, 2-0 Big 12), who scored 18 points off 14 turnovers.
Spencer Johnson led BYU (12-3, 0-2 Big 12) with 15 points and four rebounds. Trevin Knell added 15 points and four rebounds, and Dallin Hall had 13 points, four rebounds and four assists for the Cougars, who outrebounded Baylor 34-28 but gave up eight offensive boards that led to 6 second-chance points.
BYU out-fouled the host Bears 24-15, including a technical foul on head coach Mark Pope after slamming a water bottle on the scorer's table after Hall earned his fifth foul with 54 seconds remaining.
But more concerning was that the Cougars didn't make a field goal for most of the final four minutes until Knell's layup with five seconds left.
It was mostly academic, though, as Baylor went 10-of-23 from 3-point range and never trailed after converting the 16th lead change of the game into the final changeover with 8:52 to go.
Asked about the free-throw disparity after the game, Pope was cautious in his response — though the crumpled bottle in front of radio broadcasters Greg Wrubell and Mark Durrant in the final seconds may fill the significantly more tomes.
"I'd love to give you the answer I really think," Pope said, "but I won't."
Posted without comment... pic.twitter.com/owjPlDM1Fl
— Mark Durrant (@DurrantMark) January 10, 2024
Of course, it's not all a foul or free-throw disparity. There were times when the Cougars fouled, and other "50-50 balls" 'that didn't seem quite so 50-50, Pope added on his postgame radio show on BYU Radio.
"There are parts of this that are controllable," he said, before adding: "We're going to spend some in-depth time right now trying to figure out how we can soften this whistle a little bit. That's going to be really important for us, and there is some of this that is controllable. … We've just got to play above the rest of it.
"It's going to be something we grow into over time, but we're going to spend an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out how to keep our competitive fire and soften this whistle."
There were plenty of things the Cougars could control, too — like turnovers and eight offensive rebounds that led to 6 second-chance points on Baylor's end.
"We can't be a 16-turnover team in this conference," Pope said. "It just doesn't work with what we do."
After BYU's barrage of 46 3-point attempts that included a career-high nine triples from Knell yielded a loss to Cincinnati in Saturday's Big 12 opener, the Cougars went inside early against the Bears — with a fair amount of success.
BYU opened the game by making 9-of-15 from the field, with just two 3-pointers early, and led by as much as 7 midway through the first half.
The Bears came back, capping an 8-0 run with a jumper from Walter to take a 24-22 lead with 7:42 left in the half. Baylor held BYU to 1-of-7 shooting to take a 30-26 lead at the final media timeout of the first half, but Robinson had 10 points and two assists, and BYU went 7-for-7 from the foul line to take a 39-33 advantage into halftime.
Walter had 12 points at the break for the Bears, who shot just 35% from the field and matched BYU from beyond the arc at 4-of-13.
. @Robinsonjaxx with the steal@DallinHHall with the dunk🔥 pic.twitter.com/ODTC1z9KC7
— BYU Men's Basketball (@BYUMBB) January 10, 2024
The lead didn't stay.
After Knell and Aly Khalifa — who finished with six assists and two turnovers — were both sidelined with three fouls early in the second half, Love capped a 10-0 run to push the Bears back in front, 46-45, with 14:04 remaining and led by 3 just three minutes later.
Walter helped put the game away for good, capping a 10-4 spurt with an and-one play as the Bears made 6-of-8 to go up 70-63 with 4:05 remaining.
"You just have to find a way to keep moving forward; shut out all the noise and all the voices, make this a tiny bubble," Pope said. "I have a locker room where we can do that; we understand what we signed up for, that we're a really good team, and that we have areas where we were exposed and we can get better. ... It took Scott Drew 21 years to hang a banner and get this building, and that's what this requires."
BYU continues its road trip Saturday at fellow Big 12 newcomer UCF (2 p.m. MST, ESPN+).
