Final Score (W-L)             1   2   F
Evansville (23-7, 12-5 MVC)  29  38  67
Bradley (5-25, 3-14 MVC)     25  30  55
Attendance: 5,523 | Officials: Gerry Pollard, Kelly Self and Hal Lusk

The Lead
Evansville got a pair of 20+ scoring performances from its two senior stars and the Purple Aces pulled away from a 29-25 halftime lead for a 67-55 Missouri Valley Conference win at Bradley in the final home game of the season for the Braves Tuesday night at Carver Arena.

Series Update
Evansville swept the regular-season series and narrowed Bradley's all-time lead in the series to 26-22. Bradley maintains an 18-5 all-time home record against the Purple Aces. Ninth-year Evansville head coach Marty Simmons evened his all-time record against Bradley at 9-9.

Leaders
The nation's active career scoring leader, Evansville guard D.J. Balentine scored a game-high 22 points and the nation's active rebounding leader, Egidijus Mockevicius, added 20 points and 17 rebounds for the Purple Aces. Bradley placed three players in double figures, led by freshman guard Dwayne Lautier-Ogunleye, who flirted with a triple double: 11 points, eight rebounds and seven assists. Freshman center Callum Barker added 14 points and seven rebounds, while freshman guard Antoine Pittman chipped in 12 points for the Braves.

Senior Night Start
The lone senior among Bradley's 12 active players, guard Ka'Darryl Bell earned a starting nod in his final career home game. Bell scored the game's first basket, but he picked up three early fouls in the first half and was limited to four points in 14 minutes.

Second-Half Surge
Evansville scored on its first three possessions of the second half, while also forcing turnovers on Bradley's first two possessions. The combination allowed the Purple Aces to stretch a 29-25 halftime lead to 35-25 for their first double-digit lead of the night.

Youthful PT
Bradley entered the game with 10 freshmen among its 12 active players and the dozen players had totaled just 2,093 career points. By contrast, Evansville senior guard D.J. Balentine, the nation's active career scoring leader, entered the game with 2,368 career points and the entire Evansville roster entered with 7,234 career points. With Bradley's two non-seniors hampered by early foul trouble, the team's freshman accounted for 174 minutes. For the season, the Bradley freshman now have logged 5018 of the season's 6,050 available minutes (82.9 percent). As has been the case the entire season, Bradley played the full 40 minutes with at least three freshmen on the floor together.

Season Attendance
Tuesday's crowd of 5,523 fans gave Bradley a final season total of 89,299 for an increase of 1,889 total fans in the 15 games the Braves played at Carver Arena last season. While Bradley's average attendance remains second-best in The Valley, the increase in average crowd (5,953 per game) was Bradley's first average increase since 2009-10.

Up Next
Bradley will close out the 2015-16 regular-season Saturday by visiting Indiana State for a 2 p.m. (EST) tip at the Hulman Center. Saturday's season-finale will be shown on ESPN3. Evansville will host UNI in a 1 p.m. game to be shown on CBS Sports Network. The 2016 Missouri Valley Conference Men's Basketball Championship, Arch Madness, opens with first-round action March 3 at Scottrade Center in St. Louis.