With the 2018-19 season winding down, the win column is shining the brightest it has been in a decade for Bradley women’s basketball. After Thursday’s loss against UNI, the team’s record stands at 20-8.
It is the most successful season since the 2011-12 campaign when the Braves reached 18 wins. This year also denotes the first time the program reached 20 wins since the 2008-09 season. That season the team finished 20-9.
The most impressive quality of this team isn’t one you can find on the stat sheet. It’s their potential.
With scoring, rebounding and a high caliber defense in the Missouri Valley Conference, the Braves can make noise in the conference tournament, beginning on March 15. They haven’t advanced to the semifinal round of the tournament since 2009 as a four-seed.
No. 22 Drake and Missouri State are dominating the conference this season, and Bradley is the picture-perfect underdog. It will be a challenging ride to the semifinal, but Bradley can take the playoff opportunity to get smarter and learn essential lessons of winning as a team.
Any step forward is progress. A bid to the semifinal game for the first time in 10 years would be a satisfying accomplishment win or lose.
Though this year’s team may not finish with the conference crown, the prospect of competing for the title in the future is not outrageous. Historically, Bradley has not made its mark on the conference. The Braves have not advanced to the final game in the MVC tournament’s entire 36-year history.
But as the 2019 season ends and a new decade begins, the chances of controlling the conference will rise.
Only two seniors will depart this summer and a core of young players have been steadily developing. Junior Chelsea Brackmann is the conference’s best rebounder. Freshman Lasha Petree is a top-10 scorer and arguably the best freshman in the league.
Finally, sophomore Gabi Haack, the team’s leading scorer (15.4) and fifth in the MVC, is quietly laying the foundation for an enduring Bradley legacy. She averaged five more points this season than during her freshman year. Haack’s chance of being one of the conference’s top scorers in the next two seasons is plausible.
For newcomers, it will be interesting to see the recruits joining the team next season. Bradley has developed a program that acts cohesively, provides different roles for different players and has allowed room to grow.
Will Peoria be the hot spot for women’s basketball in the 2020s? If this program attracts the right recruits and makes the most of the roster it has now, Renaissance Coliseum will be gradually filling seats in the years to come.
