Louisville basketball is looking for another marquee win this afternoon as the Cardinals are facing the Baylor Bears in a February non-conference game. Louisville sits at 18-6, looking for its 19th win and fifth straight win. The Cards are coming off one of their best performances of the season as they beat North Carolina State by 41 points, and were led by Mikel Brown Jr., who scored a historic 45 points.
This Baylor team is one Louisville shouldn’t take lightly, as when fans look at their 13-11 record, they may think they're just an average team, but when you take a deeper look, you see they are much better than that record indicates. Pat Kelsey spoke to the media yesterday and, when asked about this Bears squad, issued a stern warning that this is a “dangerous” team, and the Cardinals cannot overlook the Baylor Bears.
Related: Mikel Brown Jr. is heating up and Louisville basketball fans are dreaming big
Pat Kelsey warns Louisville about Baylor’s “unbelievably dangerous” duo
Baylor sits at 13-11 on the season, including losing two straight, but they were to No. 7 Iowa State and No. 22 BYU, and they lost by a combined eight points. Baylor has a dynamic duo in its starting lineup with Cameron Carr and Tounde Yessoufou, and Kelsey made sure everyone knows this is an “unbelievably dangerous” team led by two 2026 NBA Draft first-rounders.
"They have two, in my opinion, first-round NBA Draft picks," Kelsey stated on Baylor’s two stars. "Pretty good. In fact, that's really good. In fact, that's unbelievably dangerous. Two first-round NBA draft picks, in my opinion. They're dangerous. And they got a Hall of Fame coach. He's not in yet, but he will be."
Carr and Yessoufou are two dominant underclassmen for the Bears as Carr is averaging 19.8 points, 5.9 rebounds, and 2.8 assists, 1.8 blocks, and 0.8 steals per game while shooting 52.5 percent from the field and 41.4 percent from downtown. As for his partner, Yessoufou is coming off a 37-point performance against BYU and is averaging 18.5 points, 5.8 rebounds, 1.7 assists, and 2.0 steals per game, while shooting 48.7 percent from the field.
These two guards were recently both seen in ESPN’s NBA mock draft for the 2026 NBA Draft, as Kelsey isn’t the only one who believes these two elite scorers are future first-round draft picks. This Baylor offense can score and compete with anyone, and while they might be sitting at 13-11, Kelsey understands that if these two guards get hot, Louisville is in trouble.
This should be a fun February matchup with Mikel Brown Jr. and Ryan Conwell against Carr and Yessoufou. It will be some of college basketball's best scorers on the floor, but with the Cardinals trying to earn a higher seed in the NCAA Tournament, it will be crucial for Louisville to step it up on the defensive end and try to limit Baylor’s two stars and leave Texas with a win.
Louisville and Baylor will tipoff on a neutral court inside the Dickies Arena in Dallas, Texas, at 4 p.m. local time.