What happened

Women’s basketball (11-15, 7-9 MAC) fell to the Eastern Michigan Eagles (16-11, 9-7 MAC), 60-52, Saturday at the EMU Convocation Center in Ypsilanti, Mich.

How it happened

Eagles sophomore guard Janay Morton made a layup to push the lead to eight points for the Eagles, 47-39, at the 11:32 mark in the second half. Eastern Michigan and NIU went scoreless for nearly three minutes until Eagles sophomore guard Cha Sweeney made a layup to push the Eagles’ lead to 10 points.

The teams traded baskets until Danny Pulliam, NIU redshirt senior guard, made a 3-pointer to bring the Huskies back within eight points, 58-50, with 1:20 remaining in the second half. Freshman forward Renee Sladek sank a pair of free throws to pull the Huskies within six points, 58-52, with 54 seconds left in the second half. The Huskies didn’t get any closer as Eastern Michigan scored the game’s final two points on free throws.

The Huskies jumped to a 4-0 lead to start the game, and four points would be their biggest lead of the day. Their last lead came at 24-23 with 1:23 left in the first half; they trailed 26-24 at the break.

The number: 0

That’s the number of points senior guard Amanda Corral scored in today’s game. In Corral’s nine previous games she has averaged 21.1 points by shooting 48.2 percent from the field. Today against Eastern Michigan she shot 0-8 from the field, including 0-4 from behind the 3-point line.

Northern Star players of the game

Sophomore guard Ally Lehman finished the game with a team-high 15 points and added six rebounds, four assists and one block in 37 minutes.

Sophomore guard Cha Sweeney posted a game-high 21 points and added two rebounds, one assist and two steals in 34 minutes.

The quote

“Just a sloppy performance offensively by us,” said head coach Kathi Bennett, according to an interview broadcast on NIUTube. “… Too many segments didn’t look good, didn’t look good as a team. We weren’t playing together real well.”

Up next

The Huskies come back home to face the Toledo Rockets (17-10, 10-6 MAC) 11 a.m. Wednesday at the Convocation Center.