A little pressure never hurt anyone. But it sure can make a difference in a basketball game.

Akron University threw a full-court press at the NIU men’s basketball team in chick Evans Field House Monday night that shredded the Huskies’ offense and unfastened an 80-69 win for the Zips in front of a crowd of 1,097.

Stacy Arrington netted a team-high 21 points for the Huskies, while Andrew Wells contributed 18. Eric McLaughlin posted the game high 22 points for the Zips.

“The only difference in the game tonight was the press,” Huskie coach Jim Rosborough said. “I think it caused us the most problems (of any team) on the scheudle so far.”

The fast hands and double teaming antics of AU had the Huskies carelessly dishing off the ball, which led to 27 NIU turnovers and 19 Akron steals.

“We turned the ball over too many times tonight,” Arrington said. “We weren’t in the right place at the right time. That’s all there was to it.

“I was ready to play tonight. Then they played a little zone and denied the pass back to me – I don’t know what happened after that.”

Wells said he didn’t think NIU’s problem was so much the Zips’ press as it was the Huskies’ failure to respond and execute.

“The coach told us exactly what they were going to throw at us,” Wells said. “It was just a matter of us executing and not letting them trap us, and we didn’t do that well. We could hardly get a shot at the basket, let alone get into our offense.”

It wasn’t enough that the Huskies couldn’t get their offense to click, but injury took out NIU’s 6-8 offensive threat, Antwon Harmon.

With 17:50 left to play in the game and the Huskies down 48-46, Harmon went down with a right-ankle sprain. Acting head athletic trainer, Bob Cochrane, said Harmon will be X-rayed in the morning, but will probably not play Wednesday.

“(Harmon’s injury) took out one of our key guys,” Rosborough said. “We looked at a three-guard lineup, but they played volleyball. We needed our big kids in there.”

The Huskies grasped a 14-12 lead in the opening minutes of the game but a 20-8 run by Akron gave the Zips a 32-22 edge.

While NIU was unable to ice the smooth, high-arching shot of team-leading scorer McLaughlin (22.3 points per game) in the first half, the Zips were able to do the job to Huskie leading scorer Donnell Thomas (16.3 ppg). Thomas didn’t score his first bucket until the clock had dwindled down to 9:02 left in the first 20.

A pair of Arrington free throws and a three-pointer by Marcus Coty trimmed NIU’s deficit to 34-33 with three minutes left in the half. The Huskies maintained the narrow deficit and trailed 41-39 at intermission.

Wells lifted the spirits of the crowd after Harmon went down early in the second half. Sparked by a steal, which he converted into a two-hand slam-dunk, Wells six-point spree with 14:05 on the clock lifted the Huskies to their only lead of the second half at 52-50. The Zips took off on a 9-1 scoring run, and NIU could not recover.

While the Huskies were unable to make a comeback from their deficit, they were able to contain McLaughlin to six second-half points.