The Braves won by three Wednesday night in Normal and, for that, they can thank their Missouri Valley Conference-leading field goal defense.
In conference play, Bradley has allowed a 39.3 percent conversion, but at Illinois State the struggling Redbirds scored at a 34.5 percent clip. The Braves shot worse than their 44.3 percent average but tossed up 22 more attempts from the field in the overtime win.
Although the Braves struggled early on with 3-point defense, they settled in and held the Redbirds to 4-18 shooting from distance following the 4-8 onslaught in the first 9:33.
“To start the game I was a little nervous because for two straight days all we did was ball pressure and not give up 3’s so they came out and we overhelped a few times,” head coach Brian Wardle said. “It has to be smart help this time of year. I think we got a little smarter when we stunt and recover and when a guy’s dribbling east west and not going downhill.”
Additionally, the important clutch rebounds were key for the eventual victors. Sophomore Ja’Shon Henry finished with an 11-point, 10-rebound double-double to go with four fouls. Of those rebounds, four were offensive.
“[Coach] just continues to tell me to stay aggressive and that’s just part of my game,” Henry said. “Offensive rebound, defensive rebound and I was able to find the ball in that last few minutes and especially in overtime.”
That aggressiveness was evident early on, but the Bradley defense faltered for much of the middle part of the game eventually looking at a 12-point deficit at the 18:09 mark in the second half.
The Braves got back into the game with four steals within seven minutes of each other midway through the second period. They finished a season-high of eight. Bradley also finished with 25 points off of 19 ISU turnovers.
Bradley’s defense played together winning the rebound War-on-74 by five and snagged nine more offensive rebounds than the Redbirds. That was the eventual deciding factor according to Wardle.
The senior leadership is often the determining factor down the stretch and that was key in Wednesday night’s game. Nate Kennell and Darrell Brown recorded three steals each and Koch Bar led all players with six boards in the opening stanza.
“I thought that was as good as Darrell Brown’s played defensively in a long time, I challenged him and he responded,” Wardle said.
Wardle said that the defense led to offense and it surely did after the under-8-minute media timeout in the first.
“The defense wins, it can travel,” Wardle said. “We gotta cut back on some fouling, there’s no doubt about that, but I’d rather have us be aggressive and foul then passive and give up shots.”
The Braves committed 11 fouls in the first half and front court players junior Elijah Childs, sophomore Ari Boya and Henry went into the locker room at half with two apiece.
“I’m so proud of our guys for the adversity we overcame, foul trouble all first half,” Wardle said. “We had three offensive fouls in the post, three over-the-back’s, two technicals.”
Those fouls led to Illinois State runs, but once the Braves realized what was necessary to win, they didn’t falter. Wardle said he loves ISU’s offensive action and was happy his team could stop it down the stretch.
“We were really locked in on personnel and what we had to do to get this win,” Henry said. “We knew that they were a really physical and aggressive team … we were just able to lock in and focus at the task.”
The Braves need to continue to bring the defensive intensity if they want to make a deep run next week in St. Louis, not to mention a consequential game at Carver versus Loyola Saturday afternoon.
