SAN ANTONIO — Only one night after Baylor swatted aside previously undefeated Gonzaga to capture its first national title four years ago, freshman LJ Cryer was right back in the gym getting up shots and working on his game.
He couldn’t bear another season as a fringe rotation player who logged a few scant minutes one night and didn’t leave the bench the next.
Cryer arrived at Baylor at a time when the Bears were teeming with top-tier backcourt talent. Jared Butler, Davion Mitchell, MaCio Teague and Adam Flagler were the four leading scorers on a team that lost only two games all season and never allowed a single NCAA tournament opponent to finish within nine points.
Arriving as a highly touted recruit and scarcely playing “really messes with your mental [health],” Cryer admitted Sunday. He recalled times when he cried in Baylor coach Scott Drew’s office, workouts where it was hard to motivate himself to keep giving his all. To this day, he wishes he’d been given the option to redshirt so that he’d have known ahead of time the DNPs were coming.
“It definitely fueled me,” Cryer said. “That whole summer, I was working out two or three times a day, taking a lot of extra shots. I was happy we won the national championship, but I wanted to contribute to my own national championship in a way.”
Four years after that humbling experience, Cryer is back in the national title game with a chance to make history. The Houston guard would become the first men’s or women’s Division I college basketball player ever to win championships with two different programs if the Cougars can beat fellow No. 1 seed Florida on Monday night in San Antonio.
Whereas Cryer didn’t check into the 2021 title game until the outcome had long been decided, he’ll play an entirely different role Monday night against Florida. Cryer is Houston’s leading scorer and most feared perimeter shooter, the guy who opposing coaches game plan to keep from beating them.
Cryer is averaging 15.6 points per game. His elite 42.7% shooting from behind the arc is slightly higher than he shoots from inside it. The fifth-year senior piled up 26 points against long, athletic Duke on Saturday night, keeping Houston within striking distance until its top-ranked defense at last imposed its will and
