3 Takeaways: Baylor MBB regains guards, loses Ojianwuna, blows out UCF 91-76

WACO — After losing its primary big man less than five minutes into the game, Baylor men's basketball flexed its muscle with a 91-76 win over UCF Saturday afternoon at the Foster Pavilion.

The Bears (15-8, 7-5) assisted on 20-of-32 made field goals and prevented the Knights (13-10, 4-8) from finding a consistent rhythm. The green and gold shared the sugar and bounced back from a disappointing loss to No. 13 Texas Tech, but it came at a cost.

Here are three takeaways from Baylor's bounce-back win:

Guards thrive in return

Even though Baylor was fully healthy for only five minutes – I'll get to that later – the return of VJ Edgecombe and Langston Love did not disappoint. Although Edgecombe missed just one game, his absence in the rotation was brutal. It took him a while to work his way back into the game, but five minutes in, the five-star freshman was leaping over Knights to snag rebounds like usual.

Love, on the other hand, reemerged as a safety-blanket scoring presence. It was his ninth game of the year and first since an 0-for-7 shooting performance against Utah on Dec. 31, 2024. Love went 5-for-9 from the floor and scored 16 points, just his fourth double-digit performance of the year.

The addition of Love (briefly) gave the Bears a trio of players to utilize off the bench. After weeks of having less than 10 points off the bench, the green and gold dominated the stat over UCF 40-14.

In Jeremy Roach's second game back from concussion protocol, he bounced back from a 3-for-11 shooting performance against Texas Tech with nine points and a plus/minus of 10. Roach is better when there are good players around him, allowing open 3-pointers to fall into his lap from time to time.

Baylor's guard play against the Knights was a good indicator of what the team could do when healthy from one to three. Love was arguably the most impressive scorer, while Edgecombe's defense was irreplaceable. By no means did Edgecombe look fully healthy, but having the elite trio back on the court was a good sign.

The center dilemma

Josh Ojianwuna hammered down an alley-oop from a beautiful Edgecombe feed with 17:01 in the first half. Less than two minutes later, Ojianwuna rushed the rim with the ball in his hands, was fouled by a UCF player, and fell to the floor screaming in pain and grabbing his left knee. Undoubtedly, Baylor's thinnest position was reduced to zero depth in one play.

While the details of Ojianwuna's injury are still unknown and likely will be for an extended period of time, figuring out how to manage the center position without him has to be the top priority for head coach Scott Drew.

Norchad Omier was tremendous while filling in at the five, scoring a team-high 18 points and gathering 12 rebounds in 36 minutes. All that was possible after he was called for just one foul in the first half, where he played 19 minutes. In the second half, he played 17 minutes with three fouls. But Omier was the only Bear at the five in the second half during important minutes.

Drew has shown that freshman Marino Dubravicic isn't going to fill in, and Dubravicic's raw playstyle has spoken the same. Additionally, redshirt freshman Yanis Ndjonga hasn't played all year as he rehabs from a torn ACL suffered in the summer of 2023. Baylor legitimately doesn't have a playable center on the roster other than Ojianwuna.

Sure, Omier can be that guy, but trusting a foul-prone 6-foot-7 forward to play 40 minutes a game at center seems like a disaster waiting to happen. Jalen Celestine filled in for a few minutes in the second half, but he is not the type of guy who is a sustainable backup center. The only other guy who has played this year that can guard that position would be Edgecombe, and playing him at the five seems crazy.

Outside of maybe losing Omier, the loss of Ojianwuna is the most detrimental thing that could have happened to BU at this point in the season. Staring down a quick turnaround against the top team in the Big 12 on the road with little depth will be the biggest test of the year for the green and gold.

Runnin' it up

If you flipped on the TV as a casual basketball fan during the second half Saturday afternoon, you'd have no idea Baylor was missing a key contributor. The Bears outscored the Knights 46-40 in the final 20 minutes, which included a 16-0 run and a streak where the green and gold hit 12-of-14 field goals in a seven-minute span.

Edgecombe highlighted the second half with a monster dunk and an and-1 finish, scoring 15 points in the half. While the 3-point shooting was few and far between (3-for-11), shooting from range was timely. Celestine and Roach had their fair share of open shots and knocked them down when Foster Pavilion was at its loudest. Celestine went 3-for-3 from the floor with seven points in 10 second-half minutes.

For the entire year, Baylor has been a 'second-half team,' and without Ojianwun, it was no different. Drew's halftime pep talks seem to work wonders, or maybe it's just the oranges.

What's next:

The Bears will be back in action against No. 5 Houston (18-4, 10-1) at 8 p.m. Monday at the Fertitta Center in Houston.