Home field held no advantage Wednesday afternoon, as the Huskies fell to Valparaiso 17-6 and 8-5 at Mary M. Bell Field.

With the wins, the Crusaders (20-10 overall, 3-0 Horizon) extended their program-record winning streak to 13 games.

NIU (10-14) began game one on a sour note, acquiring two errors on third baseman Stephanie Tofft for the first two plays of the day.

Things got worse quickly, as the Crusaders took advantage of the Huskies’ mistakes, scoring two in both the first and second innings.

The Huskies were shutdown offensively by Valparaiso’s Alex Lagesse, who pitched a perfect game over the weekend.

“[Lagesse] did a nice job against a very good offensive team,” said Valparaiso head coach Jordan Stevens. “[I was] very pleased to see that she continued what she did in the weekend on a team that really can swing it well.”

Lagesse improved to 7-5 on the year after pitching five shutout innings, allowing just three hits and striking out three.

Lagesse’s counterpart, junior Morgan Bittner, did not have the same level of success. NIU head coach Lindsay Chouinard was not pleased with any facet of the team’s play, but was especially disappointed in Bittner’s performance.

“Morgan gave up 13 hits and we had seven errors in the first game,” Chouinard said. “In the beginning it wasn’t helpful in her process, but we needed her to step up as a junior, and she couldn’t get it done at the end of the game.”

Bittner left after six innings, allowing 13 hits, 11 total runs and four strikeouts. She said the early errors did not affect her mentally, but facing 38 batters contributed to the struggle.

“It allowed them to go through the lineup more times so they had seen me more times,” Bittner said. “I had to throw more pitches.”

Down 11-0 in the bottom of the sixth inning, the Huskies needed to score four runs to escape the mercy rule. Shelby Miller knocked in an RBI on her first career hit, and the Huskies grabbed three more to send the game to the seventh, but were unable to make up the deficit, losing 17-6.

“Offensively we came out flat,” Tofft said. “No one was hitting at the beginning. We were down after errors [in] the first inning. It’s an energy-sucker.”

Tofft extended her hitting streak to 14 games, which included a home run in the seventh inning of game one.

The Huskies played better defense in game two, but still battled against their own mistakes. Having troubles at the shortstop position, Chouinard made a late-game switch from Amanda Sheppard to Krista Matsui. Her reasoning for the change summed up the day’s performance.

“Too many errors, too many mistakes, so it’s time to make a change,” Chouinard said.

The Huskies begin conference play on Friday in a doubleheader at home against Eastern Michigan. First pitch is scheduled for 1 p.m.