Bradley University Athletics

Braves Face Road Test At Drake Sunday

Bob Hunt - Photographer

Women's Basketball 2/11/2017 11:39:00 AM

PEORIA, Ill. – Bradley Women's Basketball will face one of its biggest tests of the season Sunday when the Braves take on league-leading Drake at 2 p.m. in Des Moines, Iowa.

The Bulldogs are undefeated in Missouri Valley Conference play at 12-0 after a 101-49 win over Illinois State Friday and Drake has won 13 consecutive games overall. In fact, Drake is 9-0 at the Knapp Center this season and has won 14 consecutive home games dating back to last January.

Bradley will look to rebound from a 70-50 loss at Northern Iowa Friday. Sophomore Vanessa Markert was the only Brave in double figures with a game-high 16 points off the bench as she reached double figures for the fifth time in seven outings.

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 along with the WIRL 1290 AM (www.1290wirl.com) radio broadcast with Ed Hammond providing play-by-play.

Bradley is tied with Southern Illinois for sixth in the MVC standings at 5-7. The Braves are a half game behind Indiana State for fifth and one-and-a-half games behind fourth-place Wichita State heading into Sunday.

Markert has scored 13 or more in five of the last seven games and has averaged a team-best 13.4 points on 56 percent shooting during that span. Seven of her 12 double-digit scoring efforts have come on the road this season and she has had 10 or more points in four consecutive road contests.

Senior Leti Lerma came away with a game-high 12 rebounds Friday at Northern Iowa to push her season total to 244 boards (T9th among Bradley season marks). Lerma has had 11 or more rebounds in six consecutive games and has averaged 14.0 boards per contest during that span. Lerma's six consecutive games with 10+ boards is the longest streak by a Brave since Carrie Coffman had nine consecutive double-digit rebounding efforts during the 1994-95 season. Coffman had a school record 20 double-doubles in 1994-95. Lerma has nine double-doubles this season and needs two more to become just the third Bradley player to tally 11 or more double-doubles in a season.
Freshman Chelsea Brackmann made both of her free throw attempts Friday at Northern Iowa and now has more three throw attempts than any other Bradley freshman. Brackmann has 105 attempts from the charity stripe, topping the previous Bradley freshman record of 104 free throw attempts set by Heather Best in 1995-96. Brackmann enters Sunday's game with 71 made free throws, which is tied for the fourth most by a Bradley frosh and she is seven makes behind Best's school freshman mark of 78. She had 12 points, eight rebounds and three assists in the season's first meeting with Drake.

Following Sunday's game at Drake, Bradley will close the season with three of five games at Renaissance Coliseum. The Braves open the stretch next Friday with a 7 p.m. game against Missouri State in the team's Play4Kay game.

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