Final score: Bradley 80 Valparaiso 69

[nomonoles4u]

This board seems to be swarming with DB fans but I for one have not missed his terrible shooting and lousy passes.
nomonoles

[Da Coach]

Maybe his injury could have affected him with the turnovers. He had 17 points, 5 assists.

Bradley 80 Valparaiso 69

https://bradleybraves.com/sidearmstats/mbball/media

JaShon Henry had 21 & 9
Koch Bay with 11 & 10
Nate with 15 & 8
Ville with 10 & 4

[KillerB]

I didn't see Mast on the bench tonight. Anyone know why?

[Da Coach]

Don't know, but if red shirt players have a night class, the coaches make them go.

[Bradley3342]

If we could have cleaned up some of the bad passes we would have won by 20. Still a nice grind it out win.

[Da Coach]

Attendance was a disappointing 5,038. I continue to believe the 6:00 pm start games are significantly hurting attendance. I know a bunch of people who skipped tonight's game because of the early start time, and there were a lot of no-shows among the season-ticket holders. Those people still get counted, but if they skipped the game, it certainly affected other ticket sales.

But it was a great game. The turnovers were pretty much the only other downside to tonight's game.
Bradley had 18 turnovers and 10 of them were recorded as steals by Valparaiso.
Valpo leads the MVC in steals, so some of the turnovers were because they have big athletic guards who play hard, and play the passing lanes well.
But at least half of those "steals" were gifts from Bradley because of bad cross-court passes.
And there were a couple turnovers that were due to bad calls. One was the traveling call on Danya Kingsby when he fell to the floor with a rebound under the basket in the 2nd half. The NCAA rule allows a player to fall to the floor, and it is not travelling. It only becomes travelling if he tries to move to improve his position. Coach Wardle was quite upset with that call by Gerry Pollard.
Here is the NCAA rule-
A player falling, lying or sitting on the floor: It is legal when a player falls and slides on the floor while holding the ball or, while lying or sitting on the floor, gains control of the ball. It is a violation if the player then rolls or attempts to stand up while holding the ball.

There was another travelling call on Ja'Shon Henry under the offensive basket when he slid his non-pivot foot. The official seemed to think he moved his pivot foot, but he clearly did not.

Some of the other encouraging stats-
Bradley outrebounded Valpo 40-27
Bradley had 17 assists on 27 baskets
Bradley had 38 points in the paint, Valpos 28
Bradley shot 52.9% overall (27-51) and 50% from three (6-12)
Bradley held Valparaiso to 39.1% overall (25-64) and 24.2% (8-33)
Bradley free throws were much better- 20-25 (80%)
Bradley lead the game for the final 38:23 (96% of the game)

[Tommy]

This board seems to be swarming with DB fans but I for one have not missed his terrible shooting and lousy passes.
nomonoles

Through their first 20 games, DB has the second best assist to turnover ratio on the team, and he is by far the team leader in assists. I get the frustration - he drives and throws up circus shots far too often and he never gets the calls from the referees, so he'd be better off only doing that occasionally to keep them honest, and passing out most of the time. Also, his incredibly terrible shooting performances on the road this year have really hurt us.

That being said, when he's not in there, our offense seems to just stand around, so I think his real importance to the team is being the floor general. And honestly, offensively, he's been fine most of the year at home.

Here's a breakdown of the assists and turnovers through the first 20 games:

Player	A's	TO's	A to TO's
Brown	97	49	1.980
Childs	15	19	0.789
Kennell	47	19	2.474
Henry	15	31	0.484
Kingsby	50	43	1.163
Bar	28	39	0.718
Tahvanainen	20	21	0.952
Gabriel	9	12	0.750
Boya	6	8	0.750
Thomas	25	17	1.471
Houpt	3	1	3.000

[Da Coach]

MVC Standings after 9 games

[BUBraves 33]

The 6pm start is definitely a pain in the ass and I’m sure it’s directly correlated with the lower attendance. Wardle said it was nice being done at 830 and the players having extra time to get home and rest. I get it, but there’s just not enough time on these weekday games to get home from work, eat, and get to the game with out being in a rush. That being said, I’m still doing what I need to to get to the game!

[Bradley3342]

I agree with BUBraves 33. These early starts have definitely hurt attendance this year. I know we discussed this earlier in the year and most of us agreed it wasn’t a good idea. Anyone on the board know who was responsible for this decision and do you think it will go back to the traditional 7:00 starts again next year?

[Da Coach]

I heard from an associate AD that it was a team decision involving staff members of the basketball program and approved by the AD. It was done to try to draw more families with younger kids. They have gotten a lot of feedback, and I suspect most of it is negative like we have seen here. But they do not intend to change anything for the remainder of this season. They will meet and discuss after the season and make a decision whether to ditch the plan or continue it next season.

[Bradley3342]

Thanks DA Coach.

[patrick_o'brian]

I have had to give away my seats to 4 games this year due to the early start. I probably could have made 2 of those, but wrangling up the wife and kids and commuting there from Farmington would put me there late. Who wants to rush around when you can just handle your affairs and watch the games on ESPN+? Not complaining, but that’s the reality of it.

[elmerb]

I would have like to seen the twin towers in there for a little bit. It gives the other teams more to prepare for and may affect their rhythm on both sides of the court. We played good ball, except for the turnovers. Now lets beat Loyola.

GO BU

[Tommy]

I would have like to seen the twin towers in there for a little bit. It gives the other teams more to prepare for and may affect their rhythm on both sides of the court. We played good ball, except for the turnovers. Now lets beat Loyola.

GO BU

Good point. That really seemed to be effective in the Indiana St. game and was actually pretty fun to watch!