PEORIA, Ill. - The Illinois State Redbirds make the short trek west on I-74 to battle the Bradley Braves, in the first of two installments of the Battle for 74.
QUICK HITTERS
• Saturday's game features two of the top five three-point shooting teams in the country, as Bradley is ranked first and Illinois State fifth
• Over the past 10 seasons in the NCAA, few schools have made a jump from one season to the next better than ISU. From last season to this season the Redbirds have jumped 334 position rankings and .108 percentage points and currently rank fifth in the country in three-point field goal percentage
• Illinois State and Bradley are two of three schools in the country to rank inside of the top-30 in the country in field goal percentage, three-point field goal percentage, and free throw percentage
• ISU forward Chase Walker gets fouled at a rate of 7.7 per 40 minutes, which is the sixth-highest rate in the NCAA
• This season the Redbirds have had nine games with single-digit turnovers, which is the second-highest total by an ISU squad since 1988-89
• If maintained, ISU's .400 three-point field goal percentage is on pace to be the fourth-best single-season average in school history
• Against Indiana State, Caden Boser scored his 1,000th career point between his time at UMKC, Valdosta State, and Illinois State.
• Jack Daugherty's 37 three-point baskets are tied for the ninth-most in a season by an ISU freshman in program history
• Malachi Poindexter has made 86.8 percent of his free throw tries over his three-year Redbird career, which is the 26th-highest active career percentage in the NCAA
• This season the Illinois State Redbirds have had seven different players lead the team in scoring through the opening 19 games of the season
• Illinois State's win against UAB on November 23 was the program's third game in a four-game stretch where the Redbird opponent was picked as the preseason favorite in their conference: Ohio (Mid-American Conference), McNeese (Southland Conference), and UAB (American Athletic Conference). In those games, the Redbirds went 2-1
• The Redbirds and Braves are two of just of six schools in the country to rank inside of the top-20 in the NCAA in both three-point field goals per game (10.3 - 20th) and three-point field goal percentage (.398 - eighth)
• This season Illinois State has a KenPom adjusted offensive percentage of 112.2, which is the highest by a Redbird squad in the KenPom era (1996 to present)
• Dalton Banks' three blocked shots against Saint Louis is tied for the fourth-most in the country this season in a game by a player 6-2 or shorter
• ISU's Chase Walker ranks 14th in the country in the KenPom stat Offensive Rebounding Percentage, and 10th in the same metric from Basketball Reference
• Eight times this season, ISU has had games with shooting splits of at least .500/.400/.750. No other team in school history has had more than four such game splits in a single season, and the Redbirds are tied for the most in the NCAA
SCOUTING BRADLEY
The Braves come into the rivalry game having won its last four games with victories over UIC, Indiana State, Murray State, and Belmont.
In Bradley's most recent game, an 89-77 win over Belmont, the Braves had five players reach double-figure scoring, led by Christian Davis' 19 points, while Jaquan Johnson scored 17. Four others - Zek Montgomery, Duke Deen, and Darius Hannah - each scored 12 points in the win. Davis pulled down a game-high 10 rebounds, with Deen leading the team with six assists.
For the season the Braves have four players averaging double-figure scoring, led by Deen's 14.4 points per game. Montgomery averages 13.7 points per game, with Hannah and Davis putting up 12.2 and 10.2 points per game, respectively. Hannah's 5.7 rebounds per game leads the Braves, who out-rebound their opponents by an average of 2.1 rebounds per game.Â
Deen leads the team with 88 assists, while Johnson is second with 44, while also leading the team with 32 steals. Davis has a team-best 23 blocked shots, with Hannah close behind with 20 on the season through 20 games.
SHOOTING STARS
Illinois State is one of only three schools in the country to rank inside of the top-30 in field goal percentage, three-point field goal percentage and free throw percentage. The sum of ISU's three rankings is 58 (24th in FG%, 5th in 3FG%, 29th in FT%), and is the third-lowest ranking sum in the country.
FOULED A LOT
Illinois State sophomore forward Chase Walker draws an average of 7.7 fouls per 40 minutes played, the sixth-largest total in the country this season.
FRESHMAN DEEP MAKES
Through the first 20 games of the season, Illinois State freshman Jack Daugherty has made 37 three-point field goals, which is tied for the ninth-most in a season by a freshman in program history.Â
REBOUNDING MARGIN
Against Northern Illinois on December 18, the Redbirds had a +20 rebounding margin, which is the highest by a Redbird team against a NCAA Division I opponent since November 29, 2014 against Youngstown State. There have been just five games with a larger margin for ISU since the 2009-10 season.
HIGH ON MAKES AND PERCENTAGE
This season the Redbirds rank fifth in the NCAA in three-point field percentage (.400) and 19th in three-pointers per game (10.4). There are just six schools in the country who rank inside of the top-20 in each category.
LOW TURNOVERS
This season, through 20 games, Illinois State has nine games with single-digit turnovers. Since 1988-89, this season's total is tied for the second-lowest in a season, along with the 2008-09 squad, and trailing only the 12 that last season's team put together.
NEAR-CONFERENCE RECORDS
In ISU's win over Trinity Christian, the Redbirds made 20-of-40 three-point field goals, which is tied for the third-most in a game in conference history. Against Belmont, Illinois State's 18 made three-pointers are the second-most in a MVC game in conference history
OFFENSIVE REBOUNDING PERCENTAGE
Through 20 games of the season, Illinois State forward Chase Walker ranks 14th in the country in the KenPom statistical category Offensive Rebounding Percentage. The statistic is the percentage of possible offensive rebounds a player gets, and the denominator is scaled based on the percentage of a team's minutes played by the player.
EIGHT IS GREAT AND NINE IS FINE
This season Illinois State has strong depth across its lineup, as the team's eighth- (Caden Boser) and ninth-leading scorers (Jordan Davis) are averaging 5.2 and 4.7 points per game each. Among players who have seen action in at least half of their teams' games, Boser has the fourth-best eighth-player scoring average, while Davis has the third-best ninth-leading scoring total.
STRONG NEW CLASS
With four signees, the Illinois State men's basketball recruiting class for the 2025 season was ranked 60th in the country according to the 247sports.com team ranking. ISU added forward Nick Allen, guard/forward Isaac Ericksen, and guards Tyreek Coleman and Mason Klabo. Allen, a 6-11 forward from Bradley-Bourbonnais HS, has a national 247sports ranking of 277, and is the top-rated center in the state of Illinois. He was named First Team All-State as a junior. Ericksen, a 6-9 guard/forward from Green Level HS in Cary, North Carolina, was named Second Team All-State as a junior, and is the 13th-rated prospect inside North Carolina. Coleman, a 6-2 guard from Waubonsie Valley HS, was named Third Team All-State as a junior. Klabo, a 6-1 guard from Fargo Davies HS in Fargo, North Dakota, was named First Team All-State three times heading into his senior season, as he is within grasp of the North Dakota boys basketball all-time scoring record.
KENPOM EFFICIENCYÂ
KenPom, the primary statistical and analysis college basketball site, and its work on tempo-based basketball statistics is compared by many to the work of Bill James in baseball. This season Illinois State's adjusted offensive total is 112.2, which is the highest total for ISU in the history of the KenPom ratings, which date back through the 1996-97 season.
PERCENTAGES ACROSS THE BOARD
Eight times this season the Illinois State men's basketball team has had games where it has made over half of its field goal tries, 40 percent of the three-point attempts, and at least 75 percent from the charity stripe. No other team in school history - outside of this season's team - has had more than four such games in an entire season. The total is also tied for the most in the country this season with St. Thomas. Since 2004-05, the most such games in a season by an NCAA Division I school is 11, held by Oklahoma State (2004-05), Michigan (2016-17), South Dakota State (2021-22), and Colorado (2023-24)..
EXCITING GAMES
Notable basketball analytics website KenPom has a statistic called Game Excitement, which is a measure of how much the win probability changed over the course of a game (using a win probability algorithm that assumes the teams are of equal strength). This season the Redbirds appear in the list twice within the top 16 games overall, with the No. 14 game coming from Illinois State's 84-83 win over UAB in the Virgin Islands, while the Redbird 99-97 overtime loss at Belmont is the 16th highest. ISU's win over UAB is the only game in the top-19 of the ranking to not have gone into overtime.
HALL OF FAMER DOUG COLLINS
On October 13, Redbird basketball legend Doug Collins was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, the highest honor for anyone associated with the game of basketball. Collins had played and worked in basketball at almost every level including being an All-American at Illinois State, an NBA top overall draft pick, an Olympian in 1972, playing for the Philadelphia 76ers, coaching the Chicago Bulls, Detroit Pistons, Philadelphia 76ers, and Washington Wizards, and an NBA and Olympic broadcaster for ABC/ESPN, CBS, NBC, TNT, and TBS. He was joined in the 2024 Hall of Fame class by 12 others including: Chauncey Billups, Vince Carter, Seimone Augustus, Bo Ryan, Michael Cooper, Walter Davis, Charles Smith, Dick Barnett, Harley Redin, Michele Timms, Jerry West, and Herb Simon.
ALL-AMERICA WATCH LIST
On Thursday, October 31, Illinois State sophomore guard Johnny Kinziger was named to the Bracketeer.org All-American watch list. Eligible conferences for the first-year award include: America East, ASUN, Big Sky, Big South, Big West, CAA, Conference USA, Horizon League, Ivy League, MAAC, MAC, MEAC, MVC, NEC, OVC, Patriot League, SoCon, Southland, SWAC, Summit League, Sun Belt, WAC. The 2025 Bracketeer.Org Non-Power Conference Player of the Year will be announced in the final week of March, 2025.Â
PRESEASON POLL
The Illinois State men's basketball team was picked to finish fourth in the preseason poll, with voters in the poll consisting of school's media, SIDs, and head coaches. Johnny Kinziger was named to the First Team, while Malachi Poindexter was picked on the second team.
