Final score: Bradley 85 UTSA 72

[Da Coach]

Next game:Bradley vs. University of Texas-San Antonio, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 7 pm at Carver Arena
Bradley is 1-1 after the loss at Washington State.
UTSA is 1-0 with a 103-77 win last Monday, Nov. 4 against Trinity University, a Division III school located in San Antonio.
They had a game scheduled Saturday, Nov. 9 at home against North Dakota, but it was cancelled because North dakota's travel to San Antonio was disrupted by weather conditions - https://goutsa.com/news/2024/11/8/und-canceled

The game is on ESPN+ - https://www.espn.com/espnplus/player...0-a2aa3949f260
Fan Links-
Live Stats- https://bradleybraves.com/sidearmstats/mbball/summary
Chat Room- https://www.chatzy.com/bradleyfans
WMBD radio- https://wmbdradio.com/player/?playerID=2045

UTSA links-
Schedule/results- https://goutsa.com/sports/mens-basketball/schedule
Roster- https://goutsa.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster
Stats- https://static.goutsa.com/stats/m_ba...easonStats.pdf

UTSA is in their second season as a member of the American Athletic Conference, after spending the previous 10 years in the Conference USA.
They have a new head coach, Austin Claunch, formerly an assistant coach at Alabama.
Their 16-man roster this season includes 15 new players- 13 players who transferred from other schools, plus one junior college transfer, and one freshman. Only one player returns from last season's roster, and he was the lowest scorer on last year's team..
UTSA was picked tied for 11th place in the 13-team AAC - https://theamerican.org/news/2024/10...-favorite.aspx

Their top scorer in their only game last Monday was Primo Spears, a 6'3" senior guard who transferred from Florida State. He scored 27 points against Trinity University. He is at his 4th school in 4 years - https://www.espn.com/mens-college-ba...0/primo-spears
Another transfer, Marcus Millender, is a 5'11" sophomore guard who transferred from University of South Alabama, is their point guard and may be their best shooter. He had 7 assists in their only game, scored 19 points, and was 3-6 from three. He shot 44% from three last year at USA.
Their guards are quick and athletic. They totalled 21 steals in their game against Trinity, scored 40 points off turnovers, and had 32 fast break points

[BengalFan14]

Wow. Primo can score. I guess he’s top of the scouting report. CD, he’s all yours!!

[Dubl R 1]

Wow. Primo can score. I guess he’s top of the scouting report. CD, he’s all yours!!

I would imagine Zek gets the first crack.

[LittleBrave]

Let's get back to feeling good - tightening up the D, coming out strong in both halves, and continue to shoot well from 3.
Duke may just go for 20. Need him to get going.

Go BRAVES!!

[tomahawk chop]

Our rebounding and team defense needs to get a lot better tomorrow night.

[bigjimmy]

First off we need establish our presence on the defensive end without fouling. Do that and the rest will take care of itself. Need to be smarter with the ball and not force something that’s not there. Don’t mind quick shots on offense as long as they aren’t forced. I expect Duke to have a good game. Hopefully 6,000 + will be in attendance and make their voices heard.

[Da Coach]

I think the ESPN+ broadcast team is Bradley grad Brian Bedo with former Bradley DBO Kristof Kendrick as the analyst.

[Da Coach]

I am not seeing Demarion Burch on the floor for markups. He must still be out.

[Da Coach]

Final score: Bradley 85 UTSA 72 - https://bradleybraves.com/sidearmstats/mbball/media

[BUfan14]

Well, that was a mixed bag. The second "quarter" of the game was what this team can do. And then the "soft" plays as Brian described them started happening in half two. Too many stupid turnovers.

Player by player: Duke had the game we all know he is capable of. Hannah was ok, could still be better. Zek was ok, played better in the second half. Atlason is a good offensive player, but he is still making the same freshman mistakes fouling and being loose with the ball. Brian sounds frustrated with that too. Connor Dillion just makes "winning plays." Davis wasn't at his best, but still made a couple nice plays. Bully recovered nicely from the last game and showed a lot of toughness again. No matter the ups and downs of being a freshmen, I think he was always bring toughness. Meta made a couple nice plays and also made a couple of bad play on both ends (especially missed open dunks/layups), so he was ok overall.

No one was particularly bad, but no one was particularly great either besides Duke and maybe Zek in half two. It's a win, and I'll be interested to see how good UTSA is this year. Have to be better on full game defensive effort and turnovers still.

[Da Coach]

Yes, Brian displayed his displeasure several times during the game (we sit a few rows behind the coaches section of the bench). He was upset at Meta for his defense, at Almar for getting the ball stolen too many times (he had 4 turnovers), and at a couple other guys for not being where they were supposed to be on offense and defense.
But there were enough good stretches to build a lead as big as 23 points midway through the 2nd half, then hold on for the 13 point win.
Wardle must have been set on playing just 8 players. Corey Thomas did not get into the game. Demarion Burch still has a boot on, and Cade Hardtke was also in street clothes.
Final stats- https://bradleybraves.com/sidearmstats/mbball/media


UTSA shot only 34.8% overall and 24.0% from three, compared with Bradley shooting 51.6% overall and 41.7% from three. The winning margin should have been more than 13, but Bradley's 18 turnovers, 11 in the 2nd half to only 2 for UTSA, kept the game closer than it should have been.
Primo Spears got 20 points, but he took 16 shots to get there. The UTSA offense appeared a bit chaotic, but that must have been by design. Fortunately for Bradley, the 3-pointers were falling.

[Big Mike]

Always good to get a W....Atlason should not start as he will foul out of every game. Also is very loose with the ball at the key.
Meta needs minutes and I still believe it will pay off.
Davis and Deen both seemed to lose footing or slip on court the whole game...was there any condensation on the court or just their shoe selection? Once we value the ball better on lazy passes and bad turnovers we can be good.

[LittleBrave]

Zek got mauled a few times and no foul! He played well I thought on both ends. Going to be tough to stop Zeko some nights.

UTSA was pretty impressive and they have talent for sure and athleticlsm. Not unhappy about only winning by 13, but the 3 concerns I have seen the last 2 games:
Allowing offensive reb’s and 2nd chance pts
Careless with the ball
Recovery on double teams, leaving wide-open 3s.

Please with the hustle tonight and effort on D.

Nice to see 8 guys contributing again on offense, and Duke finding his stroke.

Almar was shaky at times but dude can score. U can see his strides in the offseason.

CD had a rough night, but he’ll shake that off.

Gotta question Corey Thomas not even playing. Like WTH is he gonna be used sparingly? I hope I hear that he was injured or something cause that’s not a good sign if we have to rely that much on Jonovich, who has improved but should be a guy who gets 15 min max per game.

[Da Coach]

Attendance was 4,557, a slightly disappointing number. The game against SEMO (which was on a Monday) drew 5,014.
Even the exhibition game against Millikin drew a comparable crowd of 4,448.

[Tommy]

My takeaways (in my opinion):

Bully is the most high effort guy I have seen in years. If every player played as hard as that kid, there'd be no limit to how far we could go.

Almar is better at blocking out and rebounding than anyone on the team, but doesn't protect the ball well enough as pointed out by others.

Meta played a lot of minutes and looked serviceable. Not at the level Ari was playing as a senior, but the hope would be to get him there. He is getting better at contesting shots.

UTSA is just a terrible shooting team, but seemed pretty athletic. We should have won that game by 30 points.