Women’s Basketball Hits The Road

Duane Zehr

Women's Basketball 1/29/2020 2:00:00 PM

PEORIA, Ill. -- After playing five of the first seven Missouri Valley Conference games of the year at home, first-place Bradley Women's Basketball hits the road to close out the first half of the MVC schedule this weekend taking on #21/24 Missouri State Friday before a Sunday afternoon contest at Southern Illinois.

The lone undefeated team remaining in MVC play at 7-0, Bradley is off to its best overall start (16-2) through 18 games in program history along with the first 7-0 conference start in school history. The seven-game MVC win streak is the longest in Bradley history, surpassing the previous record of six last done in 2009-10 and the Braves have won eight consecutive games overall heading into the weekend.

Currently receiving votes in the latest USA Today Coaches Top 25, the Braves face nationally ranked Missouri State (16-3 overall, 6-1 MVC) Friday at 7 p.m. in Springfield, Mo., in a battle between the top two teams in the MVC standings, which opens a season-long, three-game road swing for Bradley.

Sunday's 2 p.m. game at Southern Illinois wraps up the first half of the MVC schedule for both teams. The Salukis (12-6 overall, 4-3 MVC) currently sit in a three-way tie with Illinois State and Loyola heading into a Friday night home game against the Redbirds.

Both games will be available on ESPN+ and BradleyBraves.com will provide links to live stats along with the WIRL 1290 AM radio broadcast.

Bradley ended a pair of lengthy series losing streaks over the weekend to stay perfect in MVC play, topping Northern Iowa 61-47 to snap a 16-game skid in the series with the Panthers Friday, before a 77-76 victory over Drake to bring to an end a 12-game losing streak in the series with the Bulldogs.

Bradley is the 18th team to start MVC play 7-0 since 1992-93. Eleven of the last 17 teams to start league play 7-0 went on to win the title and five claimed at least a share of second place. All 17 teams finished in the top three of the league standings.

Last weekend's sweep of the MVC Iowa schools gave Bradley victories against Northern Iowa and Drake in the same weekend for the first time in nearly 30 years. The Braves last posted wins against the Panthers and Bulldogs over the same weekend during the final year of the Gateway Conference (1991-92), which was BU head coach Andrea Gorski's senior year at Bradley. Northern Iowa and Drake have been paired as travel partners for eight of the last 28 seasons since that BU sweep, including each of the last seven years.

Bradley is receiving three points in the latest USA Today/Coaches Top 25 Poll released Tuesday. The Braves earned votes in a national top 25 poll for the first time dating back to garnering four votes in the Week 5 AP poll of the 2008-09 season after a 6-1 start which included a win over Illinois at the United Center.

The Braves are in search of their first win against a nationally ranked team Friday at #21/24 Missouri State. Bradley is 0-27 all-time against top-25 teams, which includes an 0-19 road record. After playing at #24/25 Michigan the opening weekend, Friday's game against Missouri State will mark the first time Bradley will play two games against ranked teams in the same season since 2015-16 when the Braves hosted #17/24 Oklahoma and played at #24 Iowa.

Following up last year's 20-win season with a 16-2 start to the 2019-20 campaign, Bradley boasts a 36-12 record since the start of the 2018-19 season. The 36 wins over the last two seasons are the most in a two-year stretch on The Hilltop dating back to the 2008-09 (21) and 2009-10 (17) campaigns. The school record for wins a two-year stretch is 39 by the 1979-80 (20) and 1980-81 (19) teams. In Valley play, Bradley has won a combined 17 games over the last year and a half for the most MVC wins in back-to-back seasons since the 2010-11 (7) and 2009-10 (12) seasons.

Bradley's season-best eight-game win streak is tied for the third longest in school history, behind nine-game win streaks by the 2018-19 and 2001-02 teams. Coupled with Bradley's seven-game win streak earlier this year, the Braves have two win streaks of seven of more games in the same season for the first time in program history.

Bradley has played a league-low five true road games, but the Braves are 4-1 in true road games and have seven wins away from home (3-1 neutral site record). Loyola (8) and Missouri State (8) are the only Valley team with more wins away from home than BU. Bradley's seven wins away from home are one short of the team's total from 2018-19 (7 road & 1 neutral) with at least eight games remaining away from home. The last time the Braves had more than eight wins away from home was 2011-12 (10 - 8 road & 2 neutral).

Junior Gabi Haack hit 5-of-8 three-pointers in Sunday's win against Drake, moving into second in career three-pointers made in Bradley history. Haack has 185 triples in her career, passing Genny Mueller's career total of 180 and now needs 26 trey's to break Katie Yohn's school record of 210 three-pointers. One of three players in the country this season with at least 47 three-pointers, 120 or more rebounds and at least 40 assists, Haack also climbed four spots on Bradley's career scoring list over the weekend into 15th.

Not to be outdone, sophomore Lasha Petree has now hit a three-pointer in 15 consecutive games, which is the longest streak for a Brave since Haack had 15 straight games with a triple last year and is tied for the fifth longest streak in Bradley history.

In addition to breaking the Bradley career rebounding record, senior Chelsea Brackmann recently became just the fifth player in program history with 400 career free throw attempts. She is one made free throw from pushing her career total among the top 10 in Bradley history in addition to sitting 26 points from becoming the 20th Brave to score 1,000 career points. With 974 career points, Brackmann is six points behind head coach Andrea Gorski for 20th on BU's all-time scoring chart.

Junior Nyjah White turned in her first double-double of the year (15 pts. & 11 reb.) to help highlight Friday's win against Northern Iowa. White has scored in double figures in six consecutive games, averaging 14.7 points per game over that stretch while shooting 58 percent (41-of-71), and is scoring 13.9 points per outing in MVC play. Ranking among Bradley's top three in scoring (10.6 ppg), rebounding (4.8 rpg), assists (2.6 apg), blocks (0.9 bpg) and steals (1.3 spg), she has helped Bradley to a 10-1 record this season when she has at least 10 points and the Braves are 17-3 over the last two years when she scores in double figures.

Following the weekend road trip Bradley finishes out the season-long, three-game road swing Friday, Feb. 7 at I-74 rival Illinois State.

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