GREEN BAY, Wis.—Around here women’s basketball takes the name of “Hammer Time” and appropriately so. The University of Wisconsin-Green Bay pounded out a 91-79 victory over NIU Saturday as the Phoenix clinched their first-ever North Star Conference regular-season crown.

NIU (23-7, 12-2) came out flat as a board, so UW-GB (21-5, 13-1) nailed the Huskies with a 16-5 run in the first five minutes of the contest.

“I was extremely disappointed with our play in the first half,” NIU coach Jane Albright said. “I would’ve thought after DePaul beat us that we would’ve been a little tougher mentally—we were very soft in that half.”

In front of a record crowd (866) at the Phoenix Sports Center, Green Bay had little trouble exploiting the Huskies’ tender spot. The Phoenix built a 29-11 foundation, their biggest lead of the afternoon, with 8:35 remaining in the pivotal opening period.

NIU didn’t get any compensation for its 13-7 advantage on the offensive glass until the final two minutes of the half. The Huskies’ blue-collar effort was rewarded with a 9-4 run which brought the halftime score to 43-33.

“We did a nice job contesting their first shot,” Phoenix coach Carol Hammerle admitted. “But we were giving up too many offensive boards and that almost killed us. We almost blew the game on offensive boards.”

Six times in the second half, NIU chiseled the Phoenix lead down to five points and twice the game was within a mere four, but to no avail. Each and every occasion, UW-GB either hit a bucket or a free-throw on the other end.

“We kept making a run at it,” Albright said. “But every time we would try, they’d hit a big bucket. But you just can’t get in a hole, particularly away from home in a gym like this, and expect to come up, cut the lead and then go ahead.”

NIU continued its dominance on the boards throughout the contest as the Huskies’ post ripped down a 52-40 edge in the carom category, 31 of which came on the offensive side.

And none of the Phoenix were better than Lisa Foss, who notched a game-high 28 points. The All-American candidate kept NIU in the game early as she recorded NIU’s first seven points en route to her 16-point first-half. But UW-GB countered with six players in double-figures.

“Really the game goes to Green Bay today,” Albright said. “They outplayed us, they outworked us and they were better than us.”

“I thought the big difference was our defense—more so in the second half,” Hammerle said. “I didn’t remember (Lisa Foss) scoring in the second half as much.”

Not only did the loss knock NIU out of first place, but it enables Green Bay to have the No. 1 seed for the NSC Tournament which starts Thursday. Simply meaning that NIU will probably have to play DePaul again in the semi-finals, granted the Huskies can overtake Cleveland State in the first-round.

“We’ll see how we respond,” Albright said. “We’re in DePaul’s bracket now, so we have to play Cleveland State—a team we struggled with when we were playing well.”