Baylor’s DiDi Richards celebrates a basket during the first half of the Lady Bears’ 76-50 win over West Virginia in the Big 12 title game on Sunday in Kansas City, Missouri. Charlie Riedel/Associated Press
KANSAS City, Mo. — Queen Egbo scored 18 points and 11 rebounds and No. 6 Baylor beat West Virginia 76-50 to win the Big 12 Tournament on Sunday.
It is the ninth Big 12 Championship in the last 10 tournaments for top-seeded Baylor (25-2).
Dijonai Carrington added 14 and Moon Ursin had 12 points and 10 rebounds as the Lady Bears won their 17th straight game.
Kirsten Deans scored 15 and Kysre Gondrezick had 13 for West Virginia, which was trying to win their second Big 12 Tournament in the last four years.
West Virginia (21-6) went 17 of 63 (27%) from the field and Baylor was 33 for 66 (50%).
MEN’S BASKETBALL
(3) ILLINOIS 91, (9) OHIO STATE 88: Kofi Cockburn and Ayo Dosunmu both scored 16 points, both grabbed nine rebounds and both made key plays in overtime to give the Illini (23-6) a victory over the Buckeyes (21-9) in Indianapolis for their first Big Ten Tournament title since 2005.
Cockburn made the go-ahead free throw with 1:39 to play, Dosunmu made a 15-footer with 50 seconds to go and the Illini sealed it at the free-throw line. Illinois has won seven straight overall, six in a row over top-10 foes and 14 of its last 15 overall to claim the conference’s automatic NCAA Tournament bid.
At times, Illinois appeared to be in complete control, but Ohio State refused to give in to the weariness of playing four games in four days. Instead, the Buckeyes constantly fought back.
And after erasing a 27-10 first-half lead to force overtime and even take an 81-80 lead with 2:49 to play, Illinois finally broke through thanks to Cockburn and Dosunmu.
(6) ALABAMA 80, LSU 79: Herbert Jones drove for a go-ahead layup with 19.5 seconds and the Crimson Tide (24-6) won the Southeastern Conference Tournament for the first time since 1991, holding off a late flurry to edge the Tigers (18-9) in Nashville, Tennessee.
Coach Nate Oats and the Crimson Tide added to their regular-season title with a victory that should help Alabama at least match its highest seed ever in the NCAA Tournament – it was No. 2 in both 1987 and 2002.
Alabama, the reigning national champions in football, won its seventh tournament title overall, second in the SEC only to Kentucky’s 31. The Crimson Tide (24-6) hadn’t even reached this game since 2002.
After Jones went a long way down the lane for his shot, Alabama turned to its defense.
Keon Ellis blocked a shot by LSU’s Javonte Smart and the Tigers took a timeout with just over seven seconds left to set up the final attempt.
(7) HOUSTON 91, CINCINNATI 54: Quentin Grimes scored 21 points with five 3-pointers, Marcus Sasser had 16 points and the Cougars (24-3) beat the Bearcats (12-11) in Fort Worth, Texas in the third consecutive American Athletic Conference tournament championship game between the two teams.
The Cougars were a lock for their 22nd NCAA Tournament berth even before leading the entire game to win their first conference tournament title since 2010, when they were still in Conference USA, and five seasons before Kelvin Sampson became their coach.
DeJon Jarreau, two days after a triple-double in the quarterfinal round, hit a 3-pointer for the first basket of the game to put to Cougars ahead to stay. He finished with 10 points.
Jeremiah Davenport had 11 points, all in the first half, and Mamoudou Diarra 10 for Cincinnati , which will have its NCAA Tournament steak end at nine appearances in a row.
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