PEORIA, Ill. - Bradley's four starting guards combined for 61 points and 23 rebounds and the Braves (14-13) rode their backcourt to a 76-60 non-conference victory versus Drexel (15-14) Saturday night at Carver Arena in a game created through the teams' participation in the annual BracketBusters series.
Senior guard Chris Roberts spearheaded the effort by recording an unofficial triple-double. In addition to recording his first career double-double with 15 points and a career-high-tying 11 rebounds, Roberts added 10 deflections (two more than the entire Drexel team). The 6-foot-4 wing was active all over the court and also led all players with five assists, four steals and two blocked shots.
Bradley junior guard Sam Maniscalco scored a game-high 20 points and iced the game by making all eight of his free throw attempts in the final 1:34, while junior guard Andrew Warren added 18 points and freshman guard Dyricus Simms-Edwards contributed eight points in his first career start. Drexel freshman guard Chris Fouch returned from a two-game injury absence to lead the Dragons with 16 points off the bench. Reserve forward Leon Spencer added 13 points and 10 rebounds, while Jamie Harris completed the double-digit scoring with 10 points.
Bradley recovered from a slow shooting start, missing 8-of-12 field goal attempts in the opening 8-minutes, 42 seconds, by making 23 of their final 32 shots from the floor for an ending line of 27-for-50 (.540). The Dragons did not make a similar recovery, though, carrying their 2-for-9 start in the same opening time period into a final 21-for-61 (.344) effort.
While his team started cold, Fouch came out hot when he first entered the game, draining 3-pointers on consecutive possessions less than two minutes after checking in to give the Dragons a 15-13 lead with 9:51 left in the first half. Four different Braves scored during a 9-0 run that put Bradley back in front for good, and Roberts ended the half with a highlight dunk off a baseline drive for a 33-26 advantage at the break.
Bradley's lead never dipped below five points (35-30) in the second half and the Braves maintained a double-digit lead for most of the final period.
By improving to 6-1 all-time in the February matchups in the BracketBusters series, Bradley also secured at least a final .500 non-conference record (6-5) for a seventh consecutive season, the program's longest such streak since a nine-year run from 1977-78 through 1985-86. Drexel falls to 4-2 in their February BracketBusters games.
The Braves will return to Missouri Valley Conference action Wednesday night by hosting second-place Wichita State in a 7:05 p.m. tip at Carver Arena in the annual "Senior Night" contest. Roberts and fellow seniors Ryan Phillips and Sam Singh will be honored in a special pregame ceremony and will address the crowd immediately after the final regular-season home game of the season.
