No. 5 Baylor Bears Prepare for No. 16 Virginia Cavaliers in Continental Tire Main Event
In a city famous for blackjack and championship fights, four teams ranked no higher than 21 faceoff in a college basketball heavyweight doubleheader this weekend with the Continental Tire Main Event in Las Vegas. Kicking off Friday's festivities are the No. 5 ranked Baylor Bears and the No. 16 Virginia Cavaliers, two of the last three national championship winners.
Friday's matchup will be the first basketball game for the Cavaliers since a shooting on their Charlottesville campus killed three student-athletes and injured two more, all UVA football players.
Baylor coach Scott Drew says he "wasn't privy" to any talks of canceling Friday's game, but does understand the impact of what Sunday's attack has on the Virginia campus, saying Bears players even wrote notes to the Cavalier basketball players.
“Obviously, their minds are going to be on something a little different,” Drew said. “We’ll be praying for them.”
Both teams have yet to face a ranked team, like most of college basketball, but have each displayed elite offensive outputs so far as both teams have averaged over 130 points per 100 possessions this year.
Virginia is also one of the best ball-moving teams in America, averaging only seven turnovers per game with a 78% assist rate, both top 10 in the country. Conversely, the Bears have a gawdy 17% steal rate, meaning they are swiping the ball away on almost one-fifth of their opponent's possessions.
“We have already played a few good teams, but I think this is a whole new level of basketball,” forward Caleb Lohner said. “Going out there and playing some high level games is going to be good for us in a lot of ways.”
The Bears have excelled in these November mini-tournaments under Drew, going 26-4 in such tournaments since 2013-14 and most recently winning the Battle 4 Atlantis Tournament in 2021.
“It doesn’t matter where the game is played, we want to play against the best,” Drew said. “Wherever the best competition is, we want to go there.”
Baylor is coming into Vegas with a 3-0 record and most recently pounded Northern Colorado 95-62 at the Ferrell Center Monday night. Junior guard L.J. Cryer led all scorers with 20 points on the night, after an uncharacteristic 2-12 shooting performance the game prior.
The winner of the Baylor-Virginia game will face the winner of No. 8 UCLA and No. 19 Illinois, with the losers facing off in a consolation game. The Illini start two former Bears, forward Matthew Mayer and center Dain Dainja.
Cryer is one of the many Baylor players who knows a thing or two about the new Illini stars.
“Dain Dainja was actually my roommate so it’s going to be weird seeing them in another uniform,” Cryer said. “I’ll be happy to see those guys and hey, maybe we’ll get to play them, who knows?”
Friday's game will tip off at 6 p.m. central on ESPN 2.
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