Once again, the road was an unfriendly place for the NIU women’s basketball team.

NIU fell at Akron Sunday, 78-71, ending the Huskies’ (8-13 overall, 4-4 MAC) three-game winning streak.

“If you look at the stats, we should have won,” NIU head coach Carol Owens said. “The key to the game was defensive stops that we weren’t able to get.”

While the Huskies kept close throughout most of the game, two untimely field goal droughts kept NIU from victory.

Forward Whitney Lowe led the Huskies with 26 points, a career high, in the loss. Guard Kylie York also added nine points for NIU.

“Our defense and defensive rebounding hurt us,” Lowe said. “We lost control of things we could have controlled.”

A 3-pointer by Lowe late in the second half brought the Huskies within four points of the Zips, but it wasn’t enough to get NIU over the hump.

“I thought we could have pulled it out,” Lowe said. “It was a difficult loss.”

Early foul trouble also ended up hurting the Huskies in the game.

“Becky Smith and Shari’ Welton got into early foul trouble and not having them out there hurt us,” Owens said.

“Beck and Shari’ are a huge part of our game plan,” Lowe said. “It makes the jobs of everyone else harder [when they are not in the game].”

Akron shot 47.4 percent from the field in the game, while holding NIU to 37.5 percent shooting. However, NIU outrebounded the Zips 39-31 and had a higher assist to turnover ratio.

The road loss comes after the Huskies won their first away game of the year against Miami University, followed by an impressive home win over Buffalo.

“Akron just came off a win, and that was a concern,” Owens said. “When we don’t have a good defensive presence early on we let teams gain confidence.”