Breathtaking may be the most accurate word to describe the momentous event that happened Thursday night at Chick Evans Field House.

Just ask the 6,118 chanting fans that attended the NIU women’s basketball battle with its conference rivals DePaul University.

The attendance set a new Illinois collegiate women’s basketball record, a new NIU record and helped push the Huskies to a hard-fought 92-72 win.

“The crowd can be the most positive pressure in the whole world,” said sixth-year NIU coach Jane Albright.

Her philosophy must be correct as NIU (20-4, 9-0) took control of the game, and never found themselves behind except on the first bucket of the night by DU (13-8, 5-2). After that it was all Huskies.

“It was a hard-fought game, but I hope people recognize what a great team DePaul is. It shouldn’t hurt them that they lost to us,” said Albright.

The Blue Demons wouldn’t give in to the Huskie attack throughout the game until the final three minutes. Up to that point, the game never strayed more than 13 points from DePaul, but then fatigue set in.

“I thought that our fatigue was more of a factor over the stretch than the the crowd,” said DU coach Doug Bruno.

Both teams battled to their best, but it was just a matter of which way the ball bounced and who made less mistakes as DU guard Melanee Ehrhardt pointed out.

“We worked as hard as we could. We never let down. NIU just made less mistakes than we did. I don’t think the crowd bothered us at all. It pumped us up. You block everything out, and make it seem like the crowd is there for you and not the opponent,” said Ehrhardt.

Whether DU was able to block the crowd out or not is debatable, but one thing the Blue Demons could not block was the powerful offensive performances by NIU’s Tammy Hinchee and Carol Owens.

Hinchee, who led NIU in points with 32 and rebounds with 14, was just glad to get it over with and pull out a victory.

“We have such a good rivalry with DePaul. We just wanted to win so bad against them,” said Hinchee.

Owens snagged 26 points, 17 of which were in the first half, which boosted the Huskies to a quick 18-8 lead. Owens sunk nine of NIU’s first 13 points to get the fans jumping.

“I think Carol was determined to get the job done,” said Bruno. “Stella (Woodley) did a nice job covering her in the first game (an 81-75 NIU victory),” said Bruno. “We thought why not stay with it in the second game. But after the first six minutes, we changed it when Carol went nuts.”

NIU’s Lisa Foss also turned in a stellar performance with 16 points and 100 percent free-throw shooting (10-10).

“Lisa did a super job controlling Ehrhardt (19 points). It was a big key to stop her in the second half. I would specifically like to compliment Ehrhardt. If she got another basket, I don’t know what I would have done,” said Albright.

The 23rd-ranked Huskies have been known for their versatility throughout the season with the scoring threats of Owens, Hinchee and Foss. The Blue Demons can now claim themselves as victims to the Huskie attack.

“They can go to Hinchee and Owens,” said Bruno. “They’re not an easy team. We got to pay attention to Foss, (Kris) Weis and (Denise) Dove too. Even though they are not putting the numbers on the board, they are pay-attention players.

“They just did a better job tonight than we did. Some of the shots they made were beyond All-American status,” added Bruno.