PEORIA — Bradley basketball coach Brian Wardle has seen this before. His 2025-26 Braves are the second-youngest team in the Missouri Valley Conference, based on underclassmen on team rosters.
“It reminds me a little bit of our 2019-2020 team, the young team we had,” Wardle said Saturday. “We need to play games, go through the process, help the young guys learn to focus and maintain intensity.
“They are going to have great days, they are going to have days that aren’t so good. That’s this team right now. I’m proud of them today.”
That was in the aftermath of the annual Red-White Showcase at Renaissance Coliseum, at which fans got a sneak-peek of the men’s and women’s teams for the 2025-26 season.
Team White won, 14-13, in the women’s session, while Red won the men’s scrimmage, 40-38, on a driving layup by Demarion Burch in sudden-death overtime.
‘All these guys are good guys’
In 2019-20, the Braves had seven underclassmen on their roster, including freshman Rienk Mast, Ville Tahvanainen, Antonio Thomas, and sophomores Ari Boya and Ja’Shon Henry.
That team finished fifth during the regular-season, won the Valley tournament and earned an NCAA tourney bid.
Those are lofty expectations, embraced by these 2025-26 Braves who were projected to finish fourth in the Valley’s annual preseason poll earlier this month, and have nine underclassmen on the roster.
They showed a more physical style Saturday than last year’s NIT team. And there is deep talent to develop.
“Dietrich Richardson had a day,” Wardle said. “All these guys are good guys, we’re going to have some good tape to look at.”
And off they went to a weightlifting session and later film study.
A fun, entertaining show
The young guns flashed all over RenCo on Saturday. Manual product and freshman combo guard Dietrich Richardson poured in 12 points, burying a pair of 3s, a pair of baseline jumpers and a pair of free throws during the two eight-minute scrimmage sessions.
Freshman point guard Montana Wheeler, with his parents on hand to watch, showed his active game as well.
And starting sophomore point guard Jaquan Johnson drove and drove and drove to the rim. He’ll need to improve his free throw shooting, because he’s going to draw a lot of opportunities.
Team White built a 20-9 lead, but the scrimmage ended up tied at 38 on a long 3 in the final seconds by Team Red sophomore Timoty van der Knaap.
That triggered a sudden-death overtime, where first team to score wins.
Junior guard Demarion Burch powered down the lane into traffic for a layup to win it for Team Red.
“I wanted to prove to some BU fans that I’m a good player, what kind of play they can expect from me,” Richardson said. “I had a nice shooting day.”
Wheeler is aggressive and plays with high confidence, something he showed in Bradley’s exhibition win at Green Bay when he knocked in eight straight points, including a pair of 3s.
“That’s something my dad instilled in me,” said Wheeler, referring to his father, Teddy, who coached him as a prep senior last season. “It’s how I play. I think we’re going to be a team that changes, a team that looks a lot different when you see us in January.”
A rising women’s team
The Bradley women’s team has drawn some favorable outlooks from analytic sites. BartTorvik.com, a well-regarded analytics ratings site, shows the Braves at fifth in the Valley and No. 155 in the nation heading into the season.
Bradley has nine returning players. And it added freshmen Maya Foz and Kali Fortson plus transfers Mya Wardle and Micah Cooper.
Braves coach Kate Popovec-Goss is pregnant, and reportedly due in December. The team’s plan is to have well-regarded assistant coach Stephanie Miller serve in the interim as coach while Popovec-Goss is away on maternity leave.
Bravely Speaking: News and notes from the scrimmage
Dave Eminian is the Journal Star sports columnist, and covers Bradley men’s basketball, the Rivermen and Chiefs. He writes the Cleve In The Eve sports column for pjstar.com. He can be reached at 686-3206 or deminian@pjstar.com. Follow him on X.com @icetimecleve.
This article originally appeared on Journal Star: What we saw from a young Bradley basketball team in annual Red-White Showcase
Reporting by Dave Eminian, Peoria Journal Star / Journal Star
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