After defeating Buffalo 70-61 on the road Thursday night, NIU’s matchup at Kent State on Saturday pits the MAC’s best in the east against the top dog in the west.

The Huskies (11-9 overall, 7-3 MAC) have won seven of their last eight games and are 5-0 away from home in the MAC.

“When you can win a game on the road in February and when your point guard doesn’t play particularly well, it’s great to get out of here with a win,” NIU coach Rob Judson said. “Buffalo is a good, young team. They played hard. Our experience won it. We made some threes and finished. We’re fortunate to get a win.”

Junior Marcus Smallwood continued where he left off last week, as MAC West Player of the Week, as he had his seventh double-double in eight games with 14 points and 13 rebounds.

Guard Perry Smith played an all-around game with a team-high 15 points and added six rebounds, six assists and three steals.

Freshman guard Todd Peterson made the most of his 23 minutes by connecting on 4-of-8 from three point range for 14 points. He also made his presence felt on the glass with a career-high nine rebounds.

“We made some big plays to turn the game around,” Judson said. “Todd Peterson sure made some big threes. We were 10-of-17 for three and that was definitely the difference in the game.”

The only other Huskie to reach double figures was freshman point guard Anthony Maestranzi with 11 points.

The Huskies were able to win the two effort stats Judson looks for in each game — rebounding and field goal percentage.

The Huskies shot 53.7 percent while holding the Bulls to 37.9 percent from the floor. The rebounding advantage was 39-28 in favor of NIU.

Buffalo, remained winless in the conference (3-15 overall, 0-9 MAC) even with 17 more shots and 11 fewer turnovers. The Bulls managed just eight points off the 17 Huskie miscues.

NIU now heads to Kent State for the east-west battle, where it will try and win for the first time since Feb. 1, 1986 in Kent, Ohio.

The Golden Flashes are 17-2 and 10-1 in the MAC despite losing three starters. They do return pre-season All-MAC selection Antonio Gates who is fourth in the MAC in scoring (21 points) and seventh in rebounding (7.8 rebounds). Last year they made it to the NCAA’s Elite Eight and the have won 27 of their last 29 conference games.