Pretty victories are few and far between in the Missouri Valley Conference.
The latest instance of this truth played itself out at Carver Arena on Wednesday night as Bradley and Missouri State got physical in the Braves’ 64-54 victory.
“We were average tonight,” Bradley head coach Brian Wardle said. “I had to address [that] after the game. Shot selection hurt us all game.”
If the Braves (20-8, 13-4) were average in their victory, then the first few minutes must’ve been quite scary for the visiting Bears.
Right after Missouri State head coach Dana Ford used his first timeout five minutes into the game, Bradley junior guard Duke Deen connected on a triple to extend the Braves’ lead to 16-4. By the 11:42 mark in the first half, Bradley had pulled ahead with a 20-7 advantage.
“We’re a pretty deep team,” junior forward Darius Hannah said. “We’ve got eight, nine guys that can score at will, but being able to feed off each other [helps].”
That depth continued to flex its muscles as Zek Montgomery caused frustration on a heads-up hustle play. After a missed 3-pointer, the ricochet bounced off a Missouri State player’s forehead and landed in the hands of the sophomore. The guard recovered the ball and saw daylight. His triple put BU up 27-14 and caused Ford to take another timeout with under eight to go.
Where the Braves really took advantage was underneath the rim. Forwards Rienk Mast, Malevy Leons and Ja’Shon Henry joined Hannah in punishing the visitors with several paint touches. Bradley held a 24-6 scoring edge in the post in the first 20 minutes and allowed BU to go into halftime up 37-26.
Out of the break, the Bears sharpened their claws and changed course on defense.
“I was attacking in the first half as they gave up a lot of paint points,” Hannah said. “I’m pretty sure they tried to switch it up and I had to get a little more physical with it.”
After a 7-0 run that was reminiscent of how the Braves started the first half, Missouri State came out of a timeout with a 12-2 rally to cut the deficit to single digits. Now up 46-38, Mast stood at the top of the key and nailed an open three to put Bradley up 11 with 12 minutes remaining.
That would be the final time the junior would score as the Bears’ shift to filling the lane caused the Braves to take low percentage shots from midrange and outside the arc. Missouri State escaped multiple open-but-missed 3-point shots as Bradley would go 3-13 from deep in the second half.
“Shot selection, poor decision making and passing on things we don’t work on ever concerned me a little bit,” Wardle said.
As Bradley’s lead shrank to just six points, senior guard Ville Tahvanainen sank a floater and after another misfire from Bears guard Donovan Clay, sophomore guard Connor Hickman woke the crowd up with a triple, extending Bradley’s lead to 55-44.
Clay, one of the bigger threats offensively for the visitors, went into halftime with five made field goals and 12 points. He’d end the game with 16, but failed to knock down a field goal in the second period.
The Bears continued to fight back as the second half neared its end, but Bradley’s defense never opened the floodgates, allowing the Braves to claim their first 20-win season since the 2019-20 campaign.
After the game, Hannah offered perspective on where the team is currently positioned with three games before the conference tournament in St. Louis.
“Everybody’s after us. We’re at the top but that doesn’t mean we’re gonna win and that we’re guaranteed to win every possession. You gotta get after it.”
Wardle knows the focus on bringing the first regular season championship back to the Hilltop since 1996 is like a cloud over the team. Accepting the challenge and delivering on the court is what he’d like to see Bradley do down the stretch.
“We know it’s in our hands, that’s why I told the team that this is not a championship-level performance,” Wardle stressed. “We want to get that championship but we can’t rely on anyone helping us out. All my years at Bradley I don’t think we’ve had a lot of teams help us out much when it comes to seeding.”
Three games remain on the schedule but the next hurdle to leap over is a Sunday matchup at 3 p.m. between two premier teams in the Valley. After winning 62-52 in the teams’ first matchup, the Braves will face off withSouthern Illinois in Carbondale with high stakes on the line. A win for the Braves would keep their spot atop the Valley, but a loss could see them drop to a tie for second.
