CARBONDALE, Ill. – Bradley will look to rebound from Friday's tough 73-71 loss at Evansville when the Braves play at Southern Illinois in the final road game of the 2016-17 regular season Sunday afternoon.
 
Sunday's 2 p.m. game at SIU marks the first trip to Carbondale, Ill., as head coach at Bradley for Andrea Gorski after spending the previous three seasons as Associate Head Coach at Southern Illinois.  The Braves led for nearly 22 minutes of the season's first meeting, but a late SIU push gave the Salukis a 66-57 victory at Renaissance Coliseum back on Jan. 27.
 
Southern Illinois (13-13 overall, 7-8 MVC) is one and a half games ahead of Bradley (10-17 overall, 6-10 MVC) in the Valley standings in fifth following a 57-48 home win against Illinois State Friday at SIU Arena.  With two regular-season games remaining, the Braves are two back of fourth-place Wichita State in the win column. 

Sunday's game will be available on ESPN3 as part of The Valley On ESPN3 and can be viewed through WatchESPN.com and the WatchESPN app.  In addition, BradleyBraves.com will provide links to live stats.  The matchup with the Salukis will be broadcast on WMBD 1470 AM/100.3 FM (www.1470wmbd.com) with Ed Hammond providing play-by-play.
 

• Friday's two-point loss at Evansville marked the ninth Valley contest that was a one-possession game in the final two minutes for the Braves.  In fact, five of Bradley's 10 MVC losses have been a one-possession contest in the closing two minutes of regulation and seven of 14 road games have had a margin of three points or less in the last two minutes.
• A victory at Southern Illinois Sunday would move Bradley within a half game of Southern Illinois for fifth in the Valley standings.   
• Senior Leti Lerma tied Dena Williams' (2001-05) school career rebounding record of 799 career boards Friday with nine rebounds at Evansville.  Lerma needs 12 rebounds to push her career total among the top 25 in MVC history.  She is one of six players in the nation with 280 points, 275 rebounds, 50 assists, 30 steals and 15 or more blocks through Friday and her league-leading 279 boards this season rank as the fourth-best season mark in school history. 
• Three Braves are closing in on the 300 points this season, with sophomore Vanessa Markert (299), junior Anneke Schlueter (290) and senior Leti Lerma (283) all within striking distance.  The last time Bradley had three players score 300 points in a season was 2013-14 and the Braves haven't had two non-seniors top 300 points in the same season since 2011-12.   
• Freshman Alona Johnson dished out a season-high eight assists Friday at Evansville for the most assists by a Bradley player Fantasia Vine had nine against Missouri State on Jan. 18, 2015.  Johnson's 82 assists rank as the fourth-best total by a Bradley freshman and she is fifth in the MVC in assists per game (3.0).  The last Valley freshman with at least 80 assists and 45 or more steals was Evansville's Dakota Weatherford in 2013-14. 
• Fellow freshman Chelsea Brackmann enters Sunday's game needing three boards to break the Bradley freshman rebounding mark.  The top rebounding freshman in the MVC at 6.6 boards per game, Brackmann is looking to break Heather Best's 1995-96 freshman mark of 174 rebounds. 

 
Bradley will finish out the 2016-17 regular-season schedule next Saturday, hosting I-74 rival Illinois State in a 2 p.m. game at Renaissance Coliseum.