Cincinnati Bearcats Basketball 2025-26 Storylines: Baylor Bears

CINCINNATI — The big Dan Skillings return to Cincinnati is nearly here. Cincinnati takes on the Baylor Bears on Wednesday at 6:30 p.m. ET inside Fifth Third Arena as the former Bearcat returns to the place he played for three years.

Cincinnati is 10-10 overall and 2-5 in the Big 12 this season, while Baylor is 11-8 and 1-6 in the conference. UC is ranked 59th on KenPom while Baylor is just ahead at No. 52. ESPN's Matchup Predictor gives the Bearcats a 57.9% chance to beat the Bears at home.

Both teams are flailing in Big 12 play as Cincinnati's ninth-ranked defense on KenPom matches up with the site's 23rd-best offense. UC is licking its wounds after letting ASU's 64th-ranked offense post 82 points on Saturday night.

"We didn't defend like we needed to tonight, which is frustrating because we've been playing really well there," UC head coach Wes Miller said after Saturday's latest loss. "The turnovers I thought were the worst part of the game for us, and they resulted in baskets for them. We missed layups that resulted in huge swings. We're very frustrated with tonight's performance. We're going to do what we've done all year, that's respond and get back to it and get ready to play another Big 12 game on Wednesday (at home against Baylor)."

This is another Quad 2 game for Cincinnati, which is 1-9 in Q1/Q2 games this season and 1-3 against Baylor since the start of the 1949-50 season.

Dan Descends Into Clifton

Both of these teams are disintegrating further as Big 12 play rolls on. Baylor was an NCAA tournament team as of two weeks ago, but they've crumbled across that time and have fallen from 39th in the NET rankings on Jan. 7 to 59th.

Skillings (10.3 points, 6.5 rebounds, 2.6 assists) has basically been the same player for the Bears as he was in Cincinnati. He's started 14 of 18 game appearances and is playing about the same amount of minutes per game (26.8). There hasn't been any major change with his performance (17.7 player efficiency rating last season, 16.7 this season). He's a key part of the rotation, but on the back burner among players Cincinnati needs to slow down.

Baylor has a top-25 offense by efficiency and scores 86.5 points per game (23rd). Top-five Big 12 scorer Cameron Carr (20.4 points, 5.3 rebounds, 2.3 assists) leads a bevy of five scorers, including Skillings, who average at least 10 points per game. Carr is the head of a nasty offensive serpent.

The 6-5, 175-pound guard is one of the most efficient scoring volcanoes in the country (62.7% effective field goal rate, fifth in Big 12). He's balanced, attacking the rim and shooting from outside (41.6% on 5.3 attempts per game), while only committing 1.9 turnovers per game despite a 25.4% usage rate.

Arizona State lead guard Moe Odum just destroyed Cincinnati as a less-skilled player in the same mold as Carr. UC has struggled with premier scorers a bunch this decade, and Carr can will a win on his own if Cincinnati isn't dialed into stopping him.

Day Day Thomas just came back from Arizona with two more points on his ledger and a bunch more turnovers than he left Cincinnati with. He just played the worst two-game stretch of his UC career on both ends of the floor, and Carr will drop 30 for the first time in his career if Thomas doesn't snap out of the funk.

All in all, this is a hard matchup for Cincinnati against a desperate Baylor team that has to start winning to climb back into the NCAA Tournament mix. They shoot the three very well (36.2%, 66th), rebound very well (53.5% rebounds rate, 38th), limit turnovers (11.9 per game, 185th nationally), and have gone through horrendous three-point luck on defense.

Opposing teams are shooting a scorching 35.2% from deep this season against Baylor (282nd) and also hitting 74.9% of their free throws (328th). No one should think Cincinnati will keep smashing those hot-button issues. The Bearcats rank 340th in outside shooting (30% on the season, 25.9% in Big 12 play) and 353rd in free throw shooting (65.3%, 70.6% in Big 12 play).

We are 20 games into the season, teams are what they are at this point in the calendar, and expecting these shooting marks to suddenly jolt way up is a fool's errand given historical evidence.

"Same thing we're stressing all the time, guys, there's no tricks to this," UC head coach Wes Miller said on the 700 WLW radio broadcast about what the message is after the ASU loss. "This is the best league in college basketball. It's not even close. Go through that game all you want. There are transition defensive errors; there are a lot of them. The couple were bad shots. We did have some opportunities and missed layups.

"Didn't shoot it well when we got good looks from three, and we didn't guard well. So, it's very frustrating. I thought there were some really good half-court possessions defensively, but we didn't guard well. And again, when you turn it over, and you let them loose in the open court, you have a couple breakdowns there, but we're gonna stress the same things, because when we do those things, we play well."

Cincinnati will have to slow down Carr, keep pace with those Baylor opponent shooting marks, and not let Skillings get hot in a familiar building to pull out their 11th win of the season.

It all tips off on FS1 at 6:30 p.m. ET.

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