Misfortune has recently followed the NIU men’s basketball team.

After a disappointing loss to Central Michigan over the weekend, the team’s bus broke down on the trip home.

Despite the hardships, the Huskies (4-12 overall, 1-3 MAC) hope to rebound with a conference win over Ball State (3-13, 2-2) tonight at the Convocation Center.

Ball State has the lowest scoring offense in the MAC, at 56.6 points per game. The Cardinals also rank last in scoring percentage, sinking .392 percent of their shots.

NIU head coach Ricardo Patton said statistics can always be skewed, so the Huskies must remain focused on playing good defense.

“We’ve had teams come in before that weren’t shooting a great percentage, but all of a sudden one or two guys had career nights against us,” Patton said. “What we can’t do is allow guys to come in and have career nights against us.”

The Huskies will have to keep an eye on Cardinals’ Anthony Newell and Peyton Stovall, who average 17.7 and 14.8 points per game, respectively.

“Those players have proven over a period of time to be pretty consistent in what they do,” Patton said. “So we just got to get better at what we do. That’s my biggest concern right now.”