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STATE FARM MISSOURI VALLEY CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 2, 2018

St. Louis, Missouri - Arch Madness

Bradley - 63, Drake - 61

THE MODERATOR: The victorious Bradley Braves are here. They'll have a date with Loyola tomorrow in the doubleheader's first game. Coach Brian Wardle is flanked by Darrell Brown and Donte Thomas.

BRIAN WARDLE: What a game to be a part of. No matter what the outcome was going to be, I was very proud of my team and these guys and how they responded at halftime and how they came out and fought. I thought Drake was -- obviously, they were there to win. Those seniors didn't want their season to be over with. Our one senior didn't want his to be over obviously in the second half and how he performed.

It was a great basketball game. We made some big plays down the stretch. That's what this tournament is going to come down to. I think you saw in the game before us the same thing. This league is very deep, very talented, and everybody's pretty even. You're going to have to make big plays, big shots down the stretch.

I was just proud of our defense down the stretch. I thought we buckled down the last three minutes of the game. Took care of the ball. Obviously, Darrell came out and got hot, got us going to start the second half, and Donte followed it with the offensive rebound, the energy, and our team fed off of that.

It's a great win for our group, great win for our program to get to the semis and find a way to win in a big setting. Our Bradley fans are tremendous. It was great seeing all the red out there. Hopefully, we're going to have a bunch again tomorrow.

Q. Darrell, you just needed a few days off, right?
DARRELL BROWN: Yeah, I needed a couple days to get my ankle back right. Rob and the rest of the staff helped me get ready for this game. I had a great practice yesterday, and I think it led to a good team performance today.

Q. Take us through the last couple days. I know you were in the boot most of the week, and then you got it off. What were you feeling like at that point? Did you have any idea what you had in store for you here?
DARRELL BROWN: I mean, the first two days, it was very painful coming off that Saturday game against Indiana State, but I mean, the training staff helped me get right, and I felt great. I knew I wasn't going to miss this game for anything. It's Donte's last go-round, and I had to be here for him.

Q. Donte, can you describe that last play? It looked like DLO was driving and got the shot blocked and you picked it off.
DONTE THOMAS: I thought it was a foul, but I just knew I was going to be aggressive. I thought he actually made the layup, but I've just been -- that's what I do is offensive rebound, and I just kept doing what I do, and I just got the rebound and put it back in. Luckily, I made the layup.

Q. Can you take us through the first few minutes of the second half. You guys are down eight at halftime, and then you run off that 12-0 run. Obviously, you were scoring, but you were getting a lot of stops during that time too, and it got you guys back in the game.
THE MODERATOR: Donte first and then Darrell.

DONTE THOMAS: It actually all started in the locker room. Our teammate Luqman Lundy was getting on us like Coach would, and I think we needed that, a different voice. When we got out there, DB banked some shots, we were going to get him the ball, so let's keep it rolling. That's what we did. It really started on defense. We had to lock down on defense and we couldn't just let Timmer get going and have a good second half like he did the first.

DARRELL BROWN: The second half started in the locker room, like Donte said. We had a couple guys step up and say a few things, even guys that usually don't speak that much said things. I knew it was good from there. We just did what we do, play defense, rebounded the ball, and it led to a great outcome.

Q. Just for both of you, what's going through your head when you see that half-court shot go up and not miss by a whole lot?
THE MODERATOR: Darrell, you're first on this one.

DARRELL BROWN: I pretty much followed the ball all the way from his hand. I actually thought it went in. Just thankful it didn't, and we can keep playing.

DONTE THOMAS: That was really all the basketball gods right there. Like Darrell said, I literally saw the ball like leave his hand and looked at it, the whole rotation down the court, and it looked so good. I'm like, oh, no, this can't happen. But it happened, thankful to the basketball gods.

Q. Donte, sports are so much about emotion anyway. Can you just kind of explain for us what that emotion is when you have that moment. The ball is in your hand, it's up, it's in, you've given your team a lead, and you've extended your college career too. Just everything that goes into that.
DONTE THOMAS: It's definitely been emotional for me ever since Senior Day. I know I've got good teammates, good guys on this team, good coaching staff. We're not done yet. That doesn't pass my mind at all that my college career is ending. I don't think about that. I just think about if we just do what we do, we can keep rolling. That's really all it is. That's it.

Q. Darrell, you guys are the last team to beat Loyola. How much confidence does that give you going into tomorrow's game?
DARRELL BROWN: We don't think about that at all because, I mean, like Drake, they were happy after the last time they beat us at our place. So we don't think about the last game. We've just got to clean up some things we made mistakes on tonight and just stick to our game plan, and we'll win the game.

DONTE THOMAS: For me, just going off of what Darrell said, like he said, we don't think about the past. We live in the now world, and we're really not focused on that we beat them the first game. It's how we did it, and we got to stick to those same principles that we did, and that was really defending. We took them out of most of the things they wanted to do. But they're a good team, and it's going to be a battle tomorrow.

Q. The 12-0 run to start the second half, we got their version of what happened in the locker room and beginning of the half. Tell us yours.
BRIAN WARDLE: Well, I think most staff's routines, I went in there and just fired them up right from the start. Then we go meet as a staff and talk about some adjustments we needed to make. And by the time I came back in the locker room, they were focused. I didn't have to raise my voice once. I actually sat down and just talked with them and told them about the moment, seize the moment, don't let it slip by, but we've got to play our brand of basketball. We've got to defend, and we've got to rebound and play with emotion and passion. That's what we do.

I'm an emotional, passionate coach. I've got passionate players. We've got to play that way for 20 minutes. And then we'll enjoy the outcome. They said it. I think it was -- when I walked in and the coaches, I had a good feeling. I had a good feeling on how they were looking and how focused they were. You've still got to go out on the court and do it, we've got to execute.

Just how we started, obviously, Darrell got going. I thought we contested. Made them rush a few shots. Rebounded the ball and won possession. We were losing the rebounding battle at halftime, and obviously DLO led the way, and Koch and Eli and everybody started crashing the glass and taking advantage of our size.

Q. Coach, when it comes to defending a guy like Timmer, he's going to get his points, but you guys made him work. What was the focus, and how did you strengthen it in the second half?
BRIAN WARDLE: He's a tough player. He's had a tremendous year. Tremendous senior year for him. First half, he made some tough shots. He can do that. He's a tough shot maker. His whole career he's been able to make tough shots. I thought the second half we denied him a little bit more. We pressured him a little bit more. We were more aggressive coming off the shots on the ball screens, and we made a few more adjustments.

But really it was there. We just had to play with more passion and fire on the defensive end and fly around. If we lose by playing hard, and I told them at halftime, if you look yourself in the mirror at the end of this game and we laid it all on the line and we lost, you can live with yourself, but right now you can't do it. We need to have a half where we're just flying around the glass and on defense, and that's what we do.

Q. You called time-out with 11 seconds and another one at 6. Did you change the play during that time? And did it pan out as you expected?
BRIAN WARDLE: We knew they were going to take a foul, and we weren't sure when, but they did a good job mixing and matching their zone, their 1-2-2, their man. Really we had two time-outs, which was great; we saved them. But we expected their 1-2-2 three-quarter court, and it wasn't there, so we wanted to dribble up court and burn the last time-out.

We knew they'd take a foul right away. So we had a play drawn up where we were getting the ball to Darrell's hands, obviously. After that, after they took that foul, there was a counter to it where luckily DLO was right in front of me. I told him to look for Donte and Donte, they were going to go deny DB, and you could see that. DLO made a heads up play and hit Donte basket cut. Donte, as he did all game, followed that ball to the rim and got the tip in.

I give DLO a lot of credit. That was a big time play and a smart play at the moment. I always tell him, "I appreciate when you listen to me," when I told him to hit Donte because Donte was going to be open and I knew no one would be on him. So I was hoping he'd make that play.

Q. If you could give us a quick preview of tomorrow's game. Obviously, you guys beat them in Peoria, but different setting here.
BRIAN WARDLE: The players said it. I love sitting and listening to these guys talk because it doesn't matter coming tomorrow at 2:30. We know we can play with anyone. And we know, when we bring our best, that we can beat anybody, and we're going to have to bring that tomorrow.

Loyola is going to be ready to play. They're already prepared. We've got to get our bodies ready and our minds ready. We're doing the same. We're going to have to do a few things a lot better than we did in the first half. I know Darrell said that. We have to tighten things up, play a little bit smarter.

They're a very good team. They got a scare today. Obviously, we were in a close one too. Let's toss it up and see what happens.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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