The Bradley Braves begin the final stretch of the 2023-24 Missouri Valley Conference men’s basketball season with six games remaining — three at home and three on the road.

Bradley is 17-8 overall and 9-5 in the MVC, behind first-place Indiana State (22-3, 13-1) and second-place Drake (20-5, 11-3). The Braves are one game ahead of fourth-place Southern Illinois.

“We’ll be fighting for (a top-four) place every game now,” Bradley guard Duke Deen said Saturday after a 74-67 loss to Drake. “We could have created a little separation between the top 3 if we’d won it. Now we just gotta lock in every game.”

How good was Bradley in January? Really good according to this computer model

Bradley’s MVC schedule

The Braves close with home games against Illinois-Chicago, Illinois State and Southern Illinois, the latter a potential big game as the Salukis are now one game back of BU. The Braves also have road games with UNI, Missouri State and Drake, the latter 13-0 at home this season.

“You want to finish in the top 4, you want to get a bye at Arch Madness, that’s what I think everyone’s trying to do,” Bradley coach Brian Wardle said. “I think it will be hard to catch Indiana State with their schedule. But everyone is playing each other close right now, so anything can happen.

“We need to find a way to play defense for two halves, and play smarter. If we can do that and stay healthy, I love our chances come March.”

Bradley’s Malevy Leons agrees, saying the lessons learned from games like Drake will be beneficial come the MVC tournament, scheduled for March 7-10 in St. Louis. Bradley won Arch Madness in 2019 and 2020 and finished second last season.

“This is what we’re going to see in St. Louis, tough physical battles,” Leons said. “We got to learn from this and take it with us and make it fuel us and motivate us.”

MVC and the NCAA Tournament

The winner in St. Louis gets an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. Yet with Indiana State, Drake and Bradley in control of the top three spots in the Valley race, is there a chance the MVC could be a multi-bid league for the dance? MVC commissioner Jeff Jackson — who was in attendance Saturday for the nationally televised game between Drake and Bradley — thinks so, especially with how well Indiana State is playing right now.

“Yes,” Jackson said. “I think Indiana State has proven to be at a special level. Certainly, the team is NCAA tournament-worthy if it doesn’t win the MVC tournament in March.”

After Indiana State, Drake is the next likely candidate for any potential at-large berth in the NCAAs for the Valley, which last got multiple NCAA bids in 2021 when Loyola-Chicago and Drake made the field of 68. Before that, the MVC had a stretch of four multi-bid seasons in five years between 2012 and 2016.

“The standings are what they are. I just think the league is really good,” Drake coach Darian DeVries said. “We knew what this was going to be like. We have to treat every game like it’s the one we need for a conference title.”

Indiana State is No. 20th in the NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET) rankings, while Drake is 51st and Bradley 60th. The Sycamores are 1-3 against teams in the top 25 percent of the rankings (Quad 1) and a combined 11-0 against the next 50 percent (Quad 2 and Quad 3). Drake is 3-1 vs. Quad 1 and 2-1 vs. Quad 2, while Bradley is 1-2 vs. Quad 1 and 2-2 vs. Quad 2.

NET RANKINGS: How the NCAA ranks its college basketball teams

Indiana State also is among the teams receiving votes in The Associated Press and USA TODAY coaches polls. CBS Sports has the Sycamores at No. 19 in its most recent poll.

“I think people have no clue how good the Missouri Valley is or how good basketball is at this level,” Indiana State coach Josh Schertz said during the MVC coaches conference call on Feb. 5. “It’s just the way it works. So anytime you get recognition, it’s very much appreciated. Hopefully a credit not just to Indiana State but the Missouri Valley as a whole.

“It’s very much appreciated. The most important part of any story is how it ends. That’s all anybody remembers.”