PEORIA, IL - Success away from home proved to be the key to earning the program's first NCAA Regionals bid in 47 years and Bradley Baseball will put the strategy to the test again in 2016 with a 51-game regular-season schedule that will include 36 games away from home.

Although Bradley will play only 15 games at Dozer Park in 2016, three of the top teams of 2015 will visit Bradley's home field for nearly half of those games when the Braves welcome Missouri Valley Conference rivals Missouri State (April 8-10) and Dallas Baptist (April 29-May 1) for three-game sets, as well as Big Ten Conference member Iowa (April 20) in the second half of a home-and-home series against the Hawkeyes. Missouri State (49-12) and Dallas Baptist (46-15) combined for 95 wins last season and both hosted NCAA Regionals as No. 1 seeds, while Iowa (41-18) was one of the surprise teams in the nation last year, joining Bradley as a No. 2 NCAA Regional seed.

Included on Bradley's 2016 schedule are 11 games against six teams that qualified for the 2015 NCAA Regionals, nine games against top 2 regional seeds and 15 games against eight opponents that won more than 30 games last year.

After opening the season Feb. 19-21 with a three-game series at Austin Peay, Bradley will participate in Notre Dame's Irish Alamo Invitational Feb. 25-27 in San Antonio, TX, where the Braves will open the event against SWAC Tournament champion Texas Southern, followed by a matchup against the host Irish, who were the No. 2 seed in the 2015 Champaign Regional after finishing second in the ACC Atlantic Division.

For the second year in a row, Bradley will visit McNeese State for a three-game series March 4-6. Last season, the visiting Braves blanked a 35-win McNeese State squad for all 27 innings in a series sweep that jump-started Bradley's run to the postseason.

Bradley's spring break trip will take the Braves to the Sunshine State, where Bradley will play five games in the RussMatt Baseball Central Florida Invitational, followed by a split doubleheader March 19 in Orlando against Brown and host UCF. The Florida trip will begin with three games against Bucknell (March 12-14), followed by single games against Patriot League Tournament champion Lehigh (March 16) and runaway Ivy League Red Rolfe Division champion Dartmouth (March 17).

The remainder of the March schedule will take the Braves to Iowa City March 23 to open the home-and-home series against Iowa, Indianapolis March 25-27 for four alternating games against Western Michigan and Butler and St. Louis March 30 for a matchup against the Atlantic 10 regular-season champion Billikens.

Bradley will not open its home schedule until hosting MacMurray College April 1 and the Braves will host Illinois College (April 2) and Western Illinois (April 6) before opening their Missouri Valley Conference schedule with a three-game series against defending regular-season and tournament champion Missouri State April 8-10.

The remaining non-conference games will be April 13 at Northwestern; home games April 20 versus Iowa, April 27 against Robert Morris (Peoria) and May 3 versus Robert Morris (Springfield); and May 17 at OVC runner-up SIU Edwardsville. The 21-game Valley schedule will include home sets versus Dallas Baptist (April 29-May 1) and Indiana State (May 13-15) with road trips to Evansville (April 15-17), Wichita State (April 22-24), Illinois State (May 6-8) and Southern Illinois (May 19-21).

Indiana State will host all eight Valley teams in the 2016 Missouri Valley Conference Baseball Championship May 24-28 at Bob Warn Field.