Bradley Braves get the last laugh in big victory over Missouri State
PEORIA — In one of the homes of vaudeville, it pays to always leave them laughing. Following the Bradley basketball team's 86-60 victory over visiting Missouri State, there were laughs aplenty in the Braves locker room.
Leading the merriment was Bradley senior Duke Deen, who had a big reason to joke. Despite standing just 5-foot-8, the point guard pulled down a game-high seven rebounds for the Braves. Deen’s effort spurred a dominating 41-22 advantage on the boards for the Braves against the Missouri Valley Conference’s top rebounding team.
BOX SCORE: Bradley 86, Missouri State 60
Six-foot-9 senior Darius Hannah could only chuckle about his classmate’s boasts.
“He was letting us hear about it,” Hannah said.
Junior guard Connor Hickman was excited for his backcourt mate, saying “Little man getting some rebounds, that’s always good.”
The Braves (10-5, 2-2) built a 14-point halftime lead on the leadership of Hannah and Hickman. But midway through the second half, MSU (9-6, 1-3) cut that lead to single digits and Deen picked up his third foul, sending him to the bench.
Coming out of a timeout, freshman guard Demarion Burch hit a floater followed by a layup from Hickman and a dunk by Hannah to push the lead to 62-48. The lead only grew from there. Burch, a 6-4 guard from Milwaukee, scored a career-high 11 — all in the final 10 minutes to help the Braves seal their fourth consecutive win overall and their third in a row by more than 20 points.
“(Demarion) is real comfortable right now in his role and he’s worked real hard over Christmas break,” BU coach Brian Wardle said. “He’s putting in extra time watching film. He’s in in the mornings shooting extra, and he’s learning the work ethic it takes to perform consistently at this level.
“These young guys like Demarion, Kyle (Thomas), Almar (Atlason) and Meta (Jonovic) are starting to figure it out.”
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Bradley does it with defense
Hickman was also quick to point out the Braves’ defense during that stretch.
“We’re a team where our defense feeds our offense,” Hickman said. “I think after that huddle (after Deen’s third foul), we came down and got a bucket (a layup by Hickman himself) and then came down got a stop and got another bucket on a dunk by Darius.”
That defensive effort by the Braves stymied an MSU offense with four players averaging double figures. The Bears’ leading scorer, junior guard Alston Mason, came in averaging 18.3 points per game and finished with just four points. It was just the second time this season that Mason was held to single digits.
“I like right now, when our offense isn’t clicking, we’re still guarding hard and limiting their runs,” Wardle said. “We struggled with that when we lost some games.
“Maybe that’s a sign of maturity or maybe we’re starting to click more as a group and become more connected — obviously having (Hickman) back and his voice is huge — but I really enjoyed how we performed today.”
Connor Hickman had a big game
Offensively, Hickman made his case for MVC Player of the Week. Just three days after knocking down six 3-pointers on his way to a career-high 28 points against Valparaiso, Hickman was once again on a heater.
In the first half, Hickman took advantage of a pair of screens from Hannah to jump-start the Braves’ offense. On the first screen, rather than cut, Hickman flared to the left wing and found himself with no MSU player within 10 feet as he rose and fired. On the next possession, with the ball in his hands, Hickman took a ball screen from Hannah and knocked down his second consecutive trey to break open the game.
The Bloomington (Ind.) native once again knocked down six treys on his way to a game-high 25 points. In two MVC games since returning from an ankle injury, Hickman is shooting 19-for-34 from the field (56%) and 12-for-20 (60%) from beyond the arc.
Bradley's next scheduled game is against Evansville at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 10 at Carver Arena.
This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Bradley Braves basketball: BU vs. Missouri State Bears score, result
