Baylor basketball: Bears win conference title for first time since 1950

It has been a long time since the Baylor basketball program won a conference championship.

With Scott Drew’s Baylor basketball team defeating West Virginia in Morgantown on Tuesday night, the Bears are conference champions for the first time since … 1950.

Baylor’s men’s program had not won a conference championship on the hardwood since the years following World War II. The Bears used to dominate the old Southwest Conference in the late 1940s, winning shares of four league titles from 1946-50. While Baylor has been a strong program in recent years under Drew, it all finally came together for his team on Tuesday night.

Scott Drew has transformed the Baylor basketball program into a national power

In the wake of 2003’s scandal, Drew took over this downtrodden Bears program and has rebuilt it into something marvelous. With the No. 3 team in the nation improving to 19-1 on the season, Baylor is expected to make a deep run in the 2021 NCAA Tournament. This will be the ninth time the Bears will be a part of March Madness under Drew. What a tremendous turnaround in Waco!

Though Baylor has not gone any further than the Elite Eight during Drew’s run with the team, the Bears will be in line for a high seed in the men’s tournament in Indianapolis. Yes, Baylor took advantage of basketball blue-blood Kansas having a down year, but winning on the road in Morgantown against the No. 6 team in the land is nothing to take lightly. They certainly earned it.

The last time Baylor won a men’s basketball conference title, Harry S. Truman was President.

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