DURHAM, N.C. (AP) — Baylor guard Taliah Scott is confident that her team will be able to match Duke’s physicality when the teams meet Sunday in an NCAA Tournament second-round game.
The game is a rematch of the teams' season-opener that was played in Paris. Baylor won that matchup 58-52.
“We’re going to have to out-tough them. We’re going to have to play bigger than we are,” Scott said Saturday at Cameron Indoor Stadium. “I think that we’re ready to do that.
I think we proved that we can do that in the first matchup.”
So much has changed, for both No. 3 Duke and No. 6 Baylor, since that game on November 3. The Bears (25-8) started 19-3 after climbing to No. 7 in the AP poll, but struggled down the stretch, losing in the Big 12 quarterfinals to Colorado. The Blue Devils (25-8), meanwhile, fell out of the Top 25 after a 3-6 start, but won 22 of their next 24 games, including the Atlantic Coast Conference title.
Sunday's winner will advance to face either No. 2 LSU or No. 7 Texas Tech in the Sweet 16 in Sacramento, California.
“I think any team approaching a matchup should believe they can win,” Duke coach Kara Lawson said. “We believe that. And they should, too. I’m sure they do. They already beat us. So, I’m sure they believe they can win, right.”
Center Arianna Roberson, a top reserve for Duke, did not play in that game after missing last season with a knee injury. She is now averaging 8.2 points and 5.6 rebounds in 17.2 minutes off the bench.
Such differences make it difficult for Lawson to put much stock into the initial meeting. Still, she knows better than to discount it entirely.
I definitely think we are more fortified than we were to start the year,” Lawson said. “Obviously, we have some young players that play. We start two sophomores. We bring a freshman off the bench, and so I think their growth and their maturation, I think they are different players than they were to start.”
Baylor held Duke to 29% shooting, while Scott scored 24 points to carry the Bears’ offense.
The Bears used that win as the springboard for an inspiring 10-1 start.
“I thought we were really connected in that game,” Baylor coach Nicki Collen said. “I thought as the game went along — I’m not saying our kids didn’t believe when we went to Paris that we were going to win, but I think the longer you stay in a game against an elite opponent you begin to really believe that you should be out there with them.”
Marcayla Johnson, a key rotational player for Baylor, will miss the rest of the season after tearing her ACL in practice last week. The freshman guard had played in all 32 of Baylor’s games prior to the NCAA Tournament, averaging 4.4 points and 2.2 rebounds. She was also sixth on the team in minutes (17.7).
Collen said the team is rallying around her.
"There’s a fearlessness about her,” Collen said. “She’s just someone that everyone wants to root for because she loves basketball and she loves to compete.”
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