Prior to Wednesday night’s 83-74 win over Akron, the NIU men’s basketball team passed around a bucket in the locker room.

Each player was to write down an excuse on a slip of paper and throw it in. Without any excuses to call on, the Huskies came out firing and didn’t stop until the final whistle.

Battling the flu, NIU guard Xavier Silas dropped 39 points on 9-of-17 shooting. After netting only two free-throw attempts in the first half, the senior made it to the line 18 times in the second.

“Coach kept telling me no excuses when I went over to the bench,” Silas said. “We finally got that win we needed, and hopefully we can keep it going from here.”

Freshman Nate Rucker netted 10 first-half points and continued to show signs that he could be a force in the MAC down the line.

NIU (7-11, 3-3 MAC) head coach Ricardo Patton preached throughout the week that his team would bounce back from back-to-back losses on the road.

Out of the gate, Rucker backed up his coach’s words, scoring eight of the team’s first 11 points.

Though, Rucker finished the first half with only two rebounds, the Memphis native kept the Zips’ seven foot Zeke Marshall in check.

“I think it’s pretty fun because a lot of people see me as undersized,” Rucker said. “I play much bigger than my size though. I saw what kind of player [Marshall] was on film.”

Silas picked up where Rucker left off in the first half. The third leading scorer in Division I, Silas scored 18 points on 6-of-11 shooting in the first.

With reserve players Tony Nixon and Michael Patton sidelined, NIU guard Antone Christian acted as the biggest presence off the bench. The junior scored nine points on 4-of-7 shooting in the first half. Christian finished with 13 points in 18 minutes. The Huskies held a 39-32 lead at halftime.

Within the first seven minutes of the second half, NIU had stretched its lead to 18. Following the run, however, the Huskies struggled in transition defense; allowing Akron to go on an 11-0 run that closed the lead to 58-51.

The Zips were led by a combination of Nikola Cvetinovic and Brett McClanahan on Wednesday. The two finished with 20 and 15 points respectively.

Akron cooled off following a technical foul called on Akron head coach Keith Dambrot.

“We’re not going to win a game that is that high scoring,” Dambrot said. “They played at their tempo. This team has probably been the worst defensive team I’ve ever had.”

The Zips (11-9, 2-4 MAC) got back to within seven with less than three minutes left, but got no closer with NIU making its free throws.

“This team deserves success,” Patton said. “On the sideline against Central Michigan I thought to myself that this team is very close. They just needed to figure out how to get over the hump.”