Baylor’s Golden Titty Palace (photo from World Stadiums)

Tip: 7 PM Saturday, FSN

It’s only been three weeks, but it’s once again time for the Baylor Bears and Texas Longhorns to tangle. This time, the stage is the Golden Titty Palace along the banks of the Brazos River in Waco. Last time out, Baylor (12-12 overall, 2-9 Big 12) made a great push for an upset behind an insane shooting percentage from star Aaron Bruce. In the end, the Longhorns (18-7, 8-3) prevailed with a late comeback and sealed an 84-79 victory.

The key difference this time? Aaron Bruce won’t even be playing. He sprained his ankle last week and will be missing his second-straight game when the teams meet tomorrow. Bruce accounts for 15% of their offense and plays the second-most minutes on the team with just a hair under 30 per game. In Austin, he led the Bears with 25 points, one of only two Baylor players in double digits. The slim chances the Bears had to pull off the upset at home may have gone down with the Aussie.

Without Bruce, the Baylor threat from outside is much, much weaker. Tweety Carter and Curtis Jarrells can both hit in the low 30-pecents, while Henry Dugat — Bruce’s replacement in Wednesday’s starting lineup — is also shooting the three-ball above 35%, although he takes a few less shots than the others.

If you don’t recall the other stars for Baylor — and I use that term loosely — you can take a quick gander at the first preview. This time around, Baylor will likely try to force it inside even more without Bruce, which makes big man Kevin Rogers an even bigger factor. In the game on Wednesday, Rogers blew up for 27 against Mizzou while Bruce was on the sidelines.

Mamadou Diene is still seeing very limited minutes, so his injury may still be causing problems. On Wednesday, he played only 13 minutes against the Tigers, leaving forwards Tim Bush and Patrick Fields to pick up the slack. Bush saw his playing time jump to nearly 30 minutes in the contest, and secured 11 boards with the extra time on the court.

While Coach Drew and the Bears appear to making a concerted effort to get the ball inside, they are still a good screening team that knows how to get their guards open around the perimeter. Carter is a hell of a freshman who can knock it down from long range, and he’s going to be a consistent scorer over his next three years in the green and gold. Austin-native Jerrells always manages to terrorize the Horns, and he’s coming in on a hot streak; in his last seven games, he’s averaging over 16 points.

At this point, the Longhorns just need to work on neutralizing their disadvantages inside. The Bears outrebounded Texas by three in Austin, which is an acceptable deficit for tomorrow’s game as well. But if it is too one-sided in this contest, it could lead to a lot of easy inside looks for Baylor and a lot of short possessions for the Horns.

In conclusion, the keys for Texas…

Shut down Rogers – Without Bruce, he is going to be the focal point of the offense. He’s definitely going to get his points — 20-plus would not be a surprise — but can Connor Atchley and Damion James keep him from taking over the game?

Limit the rebounds – Baylor is a bigger team, although Texas is playing more man-to-man since the last time the teams met. The Horns must keep the second-chance points to a minimum while securing their own offensive boards.

Draw fouls – What better way to neutralize the Baylor big men than to get them on the bench? Diene will likely see only 10-20 minutes, leaving the Bears with only Rogers, Bush, Fields, and Lomers. The drop in talent is huge after their top three frontcourt guys. Get them to the pine and this will be a cakewalk.