Braves Close Road Slate Sunday At UNI

Duane Zehr

Women's Basketball 2/24/2018 1:47:00 PM

CEDAR FALLS, Iowa – Bradley Women's Basketball plays its final road game of the 2017-18 regular season Sunday when the Braves visit Cedar Falls, Iowa, for a 2 p.m. matchup with Northern Iowa at the McLeod Center.

Sunday's game marks the earliest Bradley (12-15 overall, 6-10 MVC) concludes its road schedule since the 2010-11 season. The Braves have had fourth quarter leads in each of the team's last two losses following a 77-71 setback at league-leading Drake Friday.

The Northern Iowa game will be available on ESPN3 as part of the MVC media rights agreement with ESPN. The Valley On ESPN3 can be viewed through WatchESPN.com and the WatchESPN app. In addition, Ed Hammond will handle the radio broadcast which airs on WMBD 1470 AM with links to the audio streams available at BradleyBraves.com

Bradley sits in seventh in the Missouri Valley Conference standings at 6-10, one game behind I-74 rival Illinois State which plays at Drake Sunday afternoon and a half-game ahead of seventh-place Loyola (5-10), which plays at Indiana State Sunday.
With two regular-season games remaining, Bradley can finish no higher than a tie for fifth in the Valley standings but the Braves cannot earn higher than the #6 seed for the upcoming MVC Championship. At least one BU win or one Valparaiso loss would guarantee the Braves at least the #8 seed.
Freshman Gabi Haack made 6-of-12 three-pointers Friday at Drake, finishing with a team-high 22 points for her third 20-point scoring effort of the season. Haack is the first Bradley player to have two outings in the same season with six or more triples since Katie Yohn in 2009-10 and Haack's season three-point total (57) is tied for the ninth best individual total in program history. In fact, Yohn was the last Bradley player to connect on 57 trey's in a season, hitting that mark her junior (2011-12) and freshman (2009-10) seasons. The last Brave to hit at least 60 three-pointers in a season was Michelle Lund, who had 75 in 2008-09 to set the Bradley freshman record.
Haack is 10-for-20 from beyond the arc over the last two games, but her only Missouri Valley Conference game without a three-pointer this season came in the first meeting with Sunday's opponent Northern Iowa. She has joined 2016-17 MVC Player of the Year Lizzy Wendell as the only MVC freshman since 1996-97 with 55 three-pointers and at least 160 rebounds. Wendell hit 61 trey's and grabbed 170 rebounds as a freshman in 2013-14. Haack enters Sunday's game with 57 triples and 163 rebounds to go with her team-best 283 points (10.5 ppg). Haack's point total is eighth among Bradley freshman marks, while her rebound total is fifth for a Bradley freshman.
Senior Anneke Schlueter enters Sunday's outing at Northern Iowa with 996 career points and is just four points from becoming the 18^th player in Bradley history to reach 1,000 career points. Friday's contest at Drake was the 119^th career game for Schlueter, who is currently tied for third in career games played on The HIlltop. Only Williamsburg, Iowa, native Mackenzie Westcott (125) and Kelsey Budd (122) played more games than Schlueter in a Bradley uniform.
Vanessa Markert continued her strong play with 17 points on 8-of-12 shooting to go with seven rebounds Friday at Drake. Markert had a game-high 16 points in last year's matchup vs. UNI at the McLeod Center and a team-best 12 points in the season's first meeting with the Panthers. She is the first Bradley player to have 15 or more points in four consecutive games since Michelle Young did so in her final four non-conference games of the 2014-15 season. The last Brave to score 15 points or more in five straight outings was fellow Mt. Sterling, Ill., product Leah Kassing, who had seven consecutive games with 15+ points during her senior year (2011-12). Markert has averaged 18.8 points per game on 60 percent shooting to go with 7.8 rebounds and nearly two blocks per outing over the last four games and 14.9 points and 6.9 boards per game while shooting 59.5 percent from the field since the start of February (seven games).

The Braves finish out the 2017-18 regular-season schedule next Saturday with a 2 p.m. game against I-74 rival Illinois State at Renaissance Coliseum. Bradley will recognize seniors Danielle Brewer, Shareece Burrell, Madison Dellamuth, Kellee Clay and Anneke Schlueter at the conclusion of next week's matchup with the Redbirds.

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