DeKALB — While college basketball teams around the country began their regular seasons Tuesday night, the men’s basketball team had one more dress rehearsal.

Taking on Roosevelt University in an exhibition game ahead of Saturday’s home opener against Northern Iowa University, the Huskies had little trouble Tuesday from the visiting Lakers, rolling to a 29-point halftime lead before running away to an 85-50 win.

The Huskies used a 16-2 run midway through the first half to jump out to a 20-4 advantage and finished the half leading 39-10.

Overall, the NIU defense held Roosevelt to just 4-for-31 shooting in the first half and outrebounded the Lakers 39-21. The Huskies grabbed 14 boards on the offensive end and turned that into six second-chance points.

NIU stretched its lead as high as 39 points on a junior guard Zaire Mateen free throw with 13 minutes left in the game, but the Lakers shot 49% in the second half, and NIU owned just a 46-40 edge on the scoreboard in the second half.

Senior guard Eugene German, who will begin the regular season just 428 points behind T.J. Lux as the Huskies’ all-time scoring leader, paced NIU with a game-high 19 points. The senior,from Gary, Indiana shot 7-for-10 from the field and 3-for-6 from behind the 3-point arc.

In all, 11 Huskies scored with seven players scoring seven points or more. Mateen came off the bench to join German in double figures with 10 points, while junior forward Nathan Scott had nine points while grabbing seven rebounds. Junior forward Chris Johnson had a game-high 12 rebounds while adding eight points.

First-year guard Quin Riggins led Roosevelt with 13 points.

The Huskies will open the regular season 3 p.m. Saturday when they host Northern Iowa at the Convocation Center.