The Bradley men’s basketball team has had a rollercoaster of a season. The Braves started 1-3, won seven straight, suffered double-digit losses to Belmont and Murray State, went on a three-game win streak, suffered the worst loss in head coach Brian Wardle’s tenure, then won three of their next four.
At times, Bradley has looked like one of the best teams in the Missouri Valley Conference (MVC), while at other times, they’ve appeared to be punching above their weight.
What’s been consistent? Their struggles on the road.
Friday night, the Braves traveled to Cedar Falls to take on Northern Iowa, looking to extend their win streak to three games. But instead, Bradley left its offense back in Peoria, and the Panthers’ top-ranked defense bullied the Braves into submission.
Bradley was held to 33 percent shooting, scored just 10 points in the paint and had more turnovers than field goals en route to a 61-49 defeat.
“They were just the more physical team today,” senior guard Alex Huibregtse said. “We didn’t respond the way we needed to, and we let that one slip away.”
“They kind of punked us.”
Turning back the clock
The first half of the game was reminiscent of a game from the 1980s: slow-paced, tough defense and extremely physical.
Both offenses struggled to be efficient, combining to shoot 15-43 (34.8%) and score 53 points.
Bradley, in particular, struggled to move the ball along the perimeter, create driving lanes and take care of the ball. The Braves’ offense stagnated and then became careless with the ball, giving it away seven times in the first 15 minutes.
Though they struggled offensively, Bradley picked up the slack defensively, keeping them within striking distance. The Braves got through ball screens well and forced the Panthers into tough threes. At the break, they trailed 30-23.
The Braves get bullied
In the second half, the Panthers maintained high defensive intensity, bumping Bradley’s players off their spots as they cut or tried to run actions to set up their offense. Northern Iowa’s defenders hounded the Braves’ ball handlers, and they couldn’t handle the pressure, so the turnovers continued in bunches.
After the game, head coach Brian Wardle took the blame for Bradley’s offensive struggles.
“That one’s on the coaches and me that game,” Wardle said. “We did not prepare our guards for that physicality or the team for their physicality on defense, and we thought we did in our one day of prep. We should have had the scout team be much more physical and more aggressive on ball screens so our guards can make the right reads.”
“100 percent on us.”
While Bradley’s offense continued to struggle, the Panthers found more rhythm and executed their half-court sets more efficiently. The Braves’ defense wasn’t as focused to begin the second half and allowed Northern Iowa easy buckets running off of screens.
Down the stretch of the game, sophomore forward Will Hornseth, who didn’t play in Bradley’s first matchup with the Panthers this season, made his presence felt on the low block, scoring eight of his 10 in the second half.
“Hornseth killed us today,” Wardle said. “He was a problem for us, driving to his right hand and going to his left shoulder. He passed and rebounded well. It was all over the scouting report. We just struggled against him today.”
The Panthers’ latest lead grew to 19 with 6:48 to play, then Wardle called a timeout to stop the bleeding. After the timeout, the Braves came out with a sense of urgency.
They ran a play to get Huibregtse an open three, which he swished, then turned up their physicality, forcing Northern Iowa into tough three-point attempts and three turnovers.
Bradley’s offense looked the best it did all night. They got out into transition off of the Panthers’ mistakes and hit three’s or got to the basket.
Fueled by their defense, the Braves went on an 8-0 run over a 2:14 span to cut the deficit to 11 with 4:14 to play and force a timeout.
“Our last five minutes might have been our best defense of the game. We hung around because of that. That’s a positive because that hasn’t happened. When we struggle to score like that, we usually give up a lot of points.”
When play resumed, Bradley continued to guard well, forcing a missed layup on Northern Iowa’s ensuing possession. But the Panthers grabbed the offensive rebound, and senior Max Weisbrod capitalized, knocking down a three to extend their lead to 14. With that, Bradley’s momentum was zapped.
The Braves scored just two points over the last 3:14 and suffered back-breaking turnovers that spoiled any chance of a comeback.
“It wasn’t our best day,” Wardle remarked. “I don’t know if we had one player in that locker room play well today, not one. I don’t even know if we had guys play average today. It was mostly below-average performances by everyone.”
If anyone played at least average, it was sophomore guard Jaquan Johnson, who led the way with 14 points on 4-6 shooting. After being held to just one shot and two points in the first half, Johnson was a lot more aggressive and decisive when finding his shot in the second, but it wasn’t enough to get the win.
“Honestly, I feel like it starts with me,” Johnson said about the Braves’ offensive struggles. “I just have to get us going. They were hard-hedging, and I couldn’t see the reads. They were very aggressive, so it was hard to get me open shots at the beginning of the game, but once Alex [Huibregtse] started hitting a few and AJ [Smith] started hitting a few, it just opened the game up for me, but I have to start coming out more aggressively.”
With a matchup with Belmont, the MVC’s top-ranked team, on the horizon, Bradley as a whole will need a more aggressive mindset, as their Bravery will be tested again Monday at 7 p.m.
