Photo: Courtesy of Belmont Athletics
NASHVILLE – For the first time in over a month, the Belmont Bruins are beginning to look like the Belmont Bruins.
A slew of difficult results and one key injury plagued the Bruins since the start of the New Year, and Casey Alexander’s group was tested in a way Belmont basketball had not been tested since the head coach’s Belmont arrival in 2019.
The team lost six of its seven games from Jan. 13 through Feb. 3, a stretch of losing the likes Belmont had not seen in over a decade. The last time Belmont lost as many as five games in a seven-game span dates back to the 2013-2014 season under Rick Byrd. Of those five losses, two were handed to Belmont by ranked opponents in Kentucky and VCU.
Guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie was absent in all six of those Belmont losses, frustratedly forced into missing time with a wrist injury after averaging over 16 ppg to start the season. When lumping his scoring ability with his 4.4 assists and 2.5 steals per game, the sophomore would not easily be replaced, and the offense sputtered without him.
Over Belmont’s last two outings, however, the ship appears to have been righted. You can breathe again, Belmont fans.
Back-to-back victories over longtime rivals Murray State at home (69-64) and Valparaiso on the road (96-78) have Belmont winning when serious teams need to win. While Indiana State and Drake still sit atop the Missouri Valley Conference with a comfortable cushion, concluding the regular season with momentum, confidence, and the highest possible Arch Madness seed is what matters most at this point.
In those two wins, the presence of a healthy Gillespie turned the tide in favor of a reeling Belmont group. Versus Murray State, Gillespie led both teams in scoring with 24 points to pair alongside eight rebounds and five assists. In his encore performance at Valparaiso, Gillespie accounted for 18 points, four rebounds, and six assists.
Gillespie’s return also spurred Belmont’s leading scorer, Malik Dia, to put up 25 points against the Beacons, his highest single-game scoring total since paving the path to the Bruins’ win over Drake with 32 points on Jan. 7.
To extend its winning streak to three, Belmont will need to knock off a stingy Southern Illinois team on Wednesday night that comes in with a 16-9 overall record (8-6 in Conference play). The Salukis are allowing just 66.4 ppg, potentially setting the stage for an ugly game in which the Bruins will need to scrap to win.
Tipoff is set for 6:30 p.m. CT on ESPN+.
