Monday night the Baylor Bears outplayed the Gonzaga Bulldogs to win their first national championship in program history and ended Gonzaga’s perfect season winning 86-70. Stat leaders for Baylor were Jared Butler: 22 PTS, 7 AST, 3 REB MaCio Teague: 19 PTS, 0 AST, 2 REB Davion Mitchell: 15 PTS, 5 AST, 6 REB. Stat leaders for Gonzaga were Jalen Suggs: 22 PTS, 3 AST, 1 REB Corey Kispert: 12 PTS, 2 AST, 3 REB Drew Timme 12 PTS, 3 AST, 5 REB. The Bears dominated the boards, out rebounding Gonzaga 38 to 22, and their defense made Gonzaga’s top rated offense struggle. Gonzaga had a better field goal percentage 51% to 44.8%, but Baylor shot 43.5% from 3 where Gonzaga only shot 29.4% from 3 being a key difference maker in the game. For Gonzaga Jalen Suggs will likely go to the draft and be a lottery pick along with Corey Kispert being a possible top 10 pick. Kispert is one of 2 seniors for the Zags and Jalen Suggs is a probable one and done freshman. The rest of the roster will likely return along with rising star Drew Timme and are likely favorites to win the title next year with big additions coming next year from the incoming class of 2021.
Some of these incoming freshmen include 5-Star Point Guard from Millard North Hunter Sallis who will likely replace Jalen Suggs at the point guard position. Gonzaga is also the current frontrunners and likely landing spot for the 5-star center and number one ranked prospect in the country from Minneapolis, Chet Holmgren. Holmgren has not committed to a school yet, but Gonzaga is well ahead of other schools recruiting him. They will also add 4-star center Kaden Perry. Baylor will likely lose key players such as Davion Mitchell and Jared Butler to the draft. Along with seniors MaCio Teague and Mark Vital, unless they opt to come back for the extra “covid” year. This would be 4 of their 5 starters potentially leaving, so if none of these players should choose to come back it will be a very different looking Baylor team next year. However, they will be adding 5-star small forward Kendall Brown and 4-star power forward Jeremy Sochan, both players will more than likely see immediate starter minutes as freshman.
Gonzaga appears to be the favorites to win the national championship next year with +700 odds. A close second is Baylor with +850, followed by Michigan +1200, Duke +1500, and UCLA +1600. Next year appears to be another exciting year of men’s college basketball with hopefully full crowds to be there to enjoy the season.
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