Bradley Women to Tip Off Thursday DH

Defending MVC champion Braves to host McKendree in 5:30 p.m exhibition at Carver Arena

Tatum Koenig pregame introductions MVC Tourney

Missouri Valley Conference

Women's Basketball 11/3/2021 2:10:00 PM

Exhibition Game: Bradley vs. McKendree
Game Details	Thursday, Nov. 4 • 5:30 p.m. • Peoria, Ill. • Carver Arena
Audio Stream	Scout Sports Radio (Larry Larson pxp)
Game Notes	Bradley
Game Coverage	Live Stats \| Twitter: @B radleyWBB \| Instagram: @bradley_wbb

Bradley Women's Basketball will play its lone, public exhibition of the preseason Thursday as the first half of a Bradley Women's and Men's Basketball doubleheader at Carver Arena. The women's opponent, McKendree, is coached by former Braves assistant Kari Kerkhoff.

BY THE NUMBERS
5 Senior guard Gabi Haack has used the "COVID" waiver to return for a fifth year with the Braves.
6 Head coach Andrea Gorski is beginning her sixth year as Bradley head coach. A Hall-of-Fame player for the Braves from 1988-92, Gorski already ranks third in program history with 84 wins.
8 The defending MVC Tournament champion, Bradley welcomes eight newcomers to the roster as the Braves look to defend their title.
12 Bradley has played 12 regular-season women's basketball games at Carver Arena, posting a 10-2 record at the downtown home of Bradley Men's Basketball since the venue opened in 1982.

SQUAD 47
• The 2021-22 season marks the 47th year of Bradley Women's Basketball.
• Bradley Athletics officially began its sponsorship of women's basketball as an intercollegiate team for the 1975-76 season.
• The Braves competed in the old AIAW until transitioning to the NCAA in 1982, making this season Bradley's 40th as a NCAA Division I program.

SERIES HISTORY
• Bradley has never faced McKendree in a regular-season game, but the teams do have a relatively recent preseason meeting in their history.
• The Braves earned a 52-38 exhibition victory against McKendree Nov. 1, 2015 at Renaissance Coliseum.
• First-year Bradley assistant coach Leti Lerma made her Braves student-athlete debut that afternoon, contributing four points, eight rebounds and a blocked shot in her 25 minutes off the bench.
• That first meeting in 2015 also was the head-coaching debut of former Bradley assistant Kari Kerkhoff.

KERKHOFF'S RETURN
• Now beginning her seventh year as McKendree's head coach, Kari Kerkhoff was a Bradley assistant coach for six seasons, 2006-12.
• Her time on the Bradley staff included the first two postseason tournament appearances in program history as the Braves played in the 2010 and 2012 Women's Basketball Invitationals.
• Kerkhoff is one of three members of Paula Buscher's Bradley coaching staff to face the Braves as a head coach: Buscher as the SIU Edwardsville head coach in a closed scrimmage (shhh, don't tell anyone) and Jeni Garber as Quincy head coach Dec. 18, 2020.
• Bradley's 104-53 win last season against Quincy is the only one of those meetings to go down in the official records book.

5-YEAR UPSWING
• The first five years of Andrea Gorski's head coaching tenure have seen the Bradley program continue a steady and impressive rise.
• From 2015-20, Bradley became the first program in Missouri Valley Conference Women's Basketball history to improve its win total in five consecutive seasons, capped by a program-record 22 wins in 2019-20 in Gorski's fourth year at the helm.
• Despite the uncertainties created by the pandemic, the program achievements continued in 2020-21 with Bradley's first-ever MVC Tournament championship and NCAA Tournament appearance last spring.
• Having equaled the program record for victories (72) in a 4-year span from 2017-21, Bradley needs 14 wins in 2021-22 to set the program mark for the most victories in a 5-year span in program history (85, 2008-13).

VALLEY FOUR-PACK
• Head coach Andrea Gorski has played a major role in the best four years of conference play in Bradley history.
• As a Bradley Hall of Fame point guard from 1988-92, Gorski helped the Braves to a 38-34 conference record in the final four seasons of the Gateway Conference.
• Since the start of the 2017-18 season, Gorski has coached the Braves to a program-record 39 conference wins in a four-year span.
• Seven Valley wins in 2021-22 are needed to give the Braves 40 conference wins in a 4-year stretch for the first time in program history.

SCHOOL RECORDS ON TAP
• Averaging 13.8 points per game through her first four seasons, fifth-year senior guard Gabi Haack already is the second-leading scorer in Bradley history with 1,640 career points, just 39 behind Karen Anderson's 1,679 points from 1979-83.
• Anderson's total represents the longest-standing school scoring record among The Valley's 10 active programs (Lorri Bauman's 3,115 points from 1980-84 remain Drake's career scoring record).
• Already the school-record holder with 283 career 3-pointers, Haack also is second in Bradley history with 347 career free throws made, just one shy of Raisa Taylor's record 348 charity makes from 2007-11.
• And already the school-record holder with 3,808 minutes on the floor, Haack is second with 109 games started (all consecutively) and tied for fourth with 119 career games played

AND A VALLEY RECORD, TOO
• Haack also ranks second in MVC history with 283 career 3-pointers.
• Creighton's Dayna Finch set The Valley mark with 294 triples from 2001-04.

LOOKING AHEAD
• The Braves officially will open the 2021-22 season Tuesday by hosting fellow 2021 NCAA Tournament participant Wright State in a 6:30 p.m. tip at Renaissance Coliseum.
• Tuesday's season-opening tip will be preceded by a special ring presentation and championship banner unveil ceremony.
• Tuesday's game against Wright State will tip off a season-opening, 3-game home stand, which will continue Nov. 15 versus Upper Iowa and Nov. 19 against Wisconsin, both 6:30 p.m. starts at Renaissance Coliseum.

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Players Mentioned

#3 Gabi Haack: G; 5' 9"; Fifth Year

Players Mentioned

#3 Gabi Haack
: 5' 9"; Fifth Year
: G

Bradley Women to Tip Off Thursday DH

Defending MVC champion Braves to host McKendree in 5:30 p.m exhibition at Carver Arena

Players Mentioned

#3 Gabi Haack

Players Mentioned

#3 Gabi Haack