Darnell Brodie, defense lead Drake men's basketball to Missouri Valley Conference final
ST. LOUIS — Drake men's basketball went on several scoring streaks in its semifinal against Southern Illinois, but it was Darnell Brodie and the defense that led the Bulldogs to a 65-52 win over the Salukis.
“Really excited to get a win,” Drake coach Darian DeVries said after Saturday's Missouri Valley Conference Tournament game. “We knew this was gonna be a tough game. … I thought our guys did a nice job (of) not panicking, weathering the storm a little bit and getting it pushed back up to double digits, and we were able to hold on from there.”
No. 2 seed Drake advances to Sunday's MVC final, where the Bulldogs will play top-seeded Bradley, which beat Drake in the regular-season finale. Tip-off is scheduled for 1 p.m. on CBS.
This game didn’t start as expected as the Bulldogs. Three weeks ago, Drake jumped out to a 16-0 lead to open the game against Southern Illinois. But on Saturday, the third-seeded Salukis went up 9-0 on a trio of 3-pointers from Lance Jones and Xavier Johnson.
Garrett Sturtz went 4-for-4 from the charity stripe to get the Bulldogs on the board, and Drake didn’t hit a field goal for nearly five minutes.
Brodie was the one who got things going, and he scored Drake’s first two field goals. Then, around the halfway mark of the first, the Bulldogs separated themselves from their competition. Drake went on a 17-0 run and outscored the Salukis, 26-8, in the final 9:52 of the opening half.
The Bulldogs held a 39-23 lead at halftime.
But SIU was quick to chip away at that lead to start the second. The Salukis went on a 7-0 streak before Roman Penn put an end to the Salukis’ run. Still, Drake struggled as the Bulldogs collected three fouls before Southern Illinois was called for its first.
Drake was able to pull ahead again, and held a double-digit lead for much of the second half. It was enough to pull out a win and advance to the title game for the third straight year.
Penn led the Bulldogs with 16 points and added five assists.
Brodie-led defense stifles Southern Illinois
Brodie scored nine points in Drake’s first game of the tournament, but grabbed just one rebound.
He was back to his best self on Saturday, though. Brodie finished with 10 points and 17 rebounds against Southern Illinois. He was called for just one foul.
His ability to pull down rebounds slowed down Southern Illinois’ second-chance opportunities. Brodie’s scoring ignited the Bulldogs’ offense, and his defense allowed Drake to pull ahead by 16 points before the end of the first.
“Last game, I wasn’t myself,” Brodie said. “My teammates told me to come out more aggressive and be me, play like I usually do.”
Drake’s defensive dominance was a team effort.
The Bulldogs held SIU scoreless for 6:20 in the second half before a pair of free throws stopped the streak. That doesn’t happen without Garrett Sturtz going toe-to-toe with Marcuse Domask or Sardaar Calhoun’s fight in the paint or D.J. Wilkins making things difficult on the perimeter.
Drake's defense held SIU to 34% shooting from the field and 26% shooting from 3-point range. The Bulldogs won the defensive rebounding battle and had four blocks to the Salukis' one.
“It was a team effort,” Sturtz said. “The guys really came in, locked together. We tried to mix up the defense, give them different looks and stuff.”
Tucker time in the first half, team effort in the second
Tucker DeVries scored 12 points in the first half, going 5-of-9 from the field and sinking two attempts from beyond the arc.
His first-half performance was enough to push the Drake sophomore past 600 points this season. DeVries is just the fourth player in program history to record 600 points in a season.
His 3-pointer at 4:56 gave him 604 points, pushing him past All-American Willie McCarter (1967-68, 603) with the fifth-best single-season performance at Drake — and the best by any Bulldogs player since 1980-81 (Lewis Lloyd).
DeVries finished with 12 points against Southern Illinois. He registered 27 points in the quarterfinal versus Murray State. Drake needed other players to step up in the second, when SIU limited the star sophomore, and that's exactly what happened — with four players finishing in double-digits.
Alyssa Hertel is the college sports recruiting reporter for the Des Moines Register. Contact Alyssa at ahertel@dmreg.com or on Twitter @AlyssaHertel.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Drake basketball beats Southern Illinois to advance to MVC title game
