PEORIA, Ill. – After wrapping up a season-long, five-game road swing, Bradley Softball returns home to close out the regular-season series against I-74 rival Illinois State with the Braves hosting the Redbirds in a 3 p.m. game Tuesday afternoon at Petersen Hotels Field at the Louisville Slugger Sports Complex.
A total of 17 seating "pods" will be made available to the general public on a first-come, first-served basis at the stadium entrance starting at 2 p.m.
Bradley (16-17 overall, 9-11 MVC) looks to avenge a pair of losses to first-place Illinois State (27-6 overall, 13-2 MVC) after the Redbirds took two from the Braves last Thursday in Normal, Ill., to kick of the five-game road swing for BU. Thursday's game will be available on ESPN+ and BradleyBraves.com will provide links to live stats.
Bradley has won at least one home game against Illinois State in five of the last six seasons the teams have played at least one contest in Peoria going back to the 2014 campaign and the Braves are 5-4 at home against the Redbirds over that stretch.
Coming off a season-long, five-game road swing, Bradley is 10-5 at home this season and the Braves have won five of their last six contests played at home. Bradley had played just 10 true road games in 2021 prior to the recently completed stretch of five straight road games and had not played more than four consecutive road/neutral site outings before concluding the five-game swing Sunday in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Tuesday's home game against Illinois State at Petersen Hotels Field at the Louisville Slugger Sports Complex is Bradley's lone home contest in a nine-game stretch and only home game in a 20-day span before closing out the regular season with a three-game home series against Drake May 8 & 9. The Braves are 7-2 at home in MVC play to match the team's highest conference win total since posting a 10-6 home mark in conference action in 2015.
Jillian Navarro belted a pair of home runs in Sunday's series finale at Northern Iowa to move into the top five in career homers at Bradley. Navarro, who collected the 17th multi-homer game on record in program history, is the second Brave with a multi-homer game this season; joining Avry Blume (April 11 at Loyola). Navarro pushed her career home run total to 17 and is now tied with Maria Schroeder for fifth in career home runs at BU. Taise Thompson added a home run of her own Saturday at UNI for the 14th of her career, which moved her into a tie for 10th in school history.
Six of Lucy Mead's team-best 10 stolen bases have come in home contests and she has swiped seven bases in MVC contests this year. Mead is the first Brave to steal 10 or more bags since Kelly Kapp had a MVC season record 41 stolen bases in 2017. Hitting .327 in league action with six RBI against Valley opponents, Mead needs two more RBI to become the first Bradley player with 10 stolen bases and 10 RBI in a season since Kapp did so in 2016. As a team, Bradley has 30 stolen bases this spring for the team's highest total dating back 2017 (54).
Bradley follows up the final mid-week game of the season with a three-game series at Evansville Saturday and Sunday to close out the road portion of the regular-season schedule.
