She was already crowned MAC Player of the Week and was about to cap another stellar offensive night with 17 kills.

It was only fitting that in the final home game of her career, senior outside hitter Corinne Walsh scored the final point of the match with an emphatic kill to finish off Akron.

The No. 8 seed Huskies advanced to the quarterfinals of the MAC Championship with a 22-30, 30-16, 30-24, 30-18 victory over the No. 9 seed Zips Tuesday night at Victor E. Court.

Coming into the match, Walsh compiled 40 kills and a .493 hitting percentage in two wins against Akron and Buffalo last week to clinch the No. 8 seed for the postseason. Her 17 kills and inspired attacks helped the Huskies hit over .300 for the final three games.

“It’s awesome,” Walsh said. “Being it’s our last home game, our team really stepped up for our seniors to win it so we didn’t end it here. I can only do what I do because of our team. We back each other up.”

In game one, the Huskies (16-16 overall, 8-9 MAC) built a 10-6 lead, but tightened up as the game progressed. Akron (10-20, 4-13) came back by scoring 16 of the next 19 points and ran away with the game by a 30-22 mark.

The sloppy play in the first game awoke NIU’s offense for game two as NIU built a 7-4 lead that it would not relinquish. Sophomore outside hitter Amy Ward and Walsh added five kills apiece in the game to pace the Huskies to a .378 hitting percentage while the defense limited the Zips to nine kills as a team.

Game three and four brought more of the same as NIU outscored Akron 38 to 22 in kills. With a 26-10 lead in game four, Coach Ray Gooden sent in the subs and the Huskies finished off the Zips 30-18.

The win marked a season-high four match win streak for NIU. An increased offensive role by Ward and Walsh in recent weeks has helped take the scoring pressure off junior middle blocker Kate McCullagh, who recently passed 600 kills for the season. McCullagh, who scored a match-high 21 kills, said she was more than grateful for the recent surge.

“I couldn’t be any happier,” the Woodstock native said. “I would like to be greedy and say I want all the kills. But that can’t happen in a team sport. I’m very happy for them and glad they’re helping me out.”

With No. 1 seed Ohio looming in the next round, Gooden said his team will have to be firing on all cylinders in order to beat the 26-2 Bobcats.

“We have to play our best match because we’re playing the best team on Friday,” Gooden said. “We know we’re capable of playing at their level, we just have to sustain it for a long period of time. We have to beat the best to move on.”