DEKALB, ILL. – Northern Illinois University had a pair of rushers surpass the century-mark in the Huskies 49-21 win over Eastern Michigan University Saturday afternoon. In the first half NIU, shutout the Eastern Michigan offense, while scoring 35 first half points.
Northern Illinois University (5-3, 3-1) would score on 8 of 15 possessions in this game, all of which resulting in touchdowns.
NIU had 591-yards of total offense, 322 of those yards being on the ground with eight different rushers throughout the game.
Huskies running back Jordan Huff had a career high 10 carries for 128-yards and a touchdown, while sharing the carries with Joel Bouagnon who compiled 26 carries for 136-yards, and a touchdown.
“Good,” Head coach of NIU Rod Carey said in regards to the Huskies running game. “There’s really no other way to put it. Good.”
Eastern Michigan’s (1-7, 0-4) defense made a few key plays getting to the quarterback, forcing the Huskies to rush passes, and knocking down balls. But facing a talented offense like NIU also caused lots of issues.
“Our defense, in a lot of ways, played better today,” said Eastern Michigan coach Chris Creighton.
The EMU defense struggled stopping the Huskies on third down, as NIU went 15-of-23 on third down conversions, multiple times picking up first downs on third and long.
“I thought their timing on the comeback routes to the outside receiver (were good),” said Creighton. “When you throw the perfect ball, you put your feet in the ground, you come back to it, it’s really hard to defend. We did knock a couple of those down. Their timing on that was excellent.”
Offensively EMU couldn’t get much going in the first half, as the offense never reached the Huskies 30-yard line until the third quarter.
Most of EMU’s productivity came on the ground with Darius Jackson leading the team with 24-carries for 101-yards and a pair of touchdowns.
Eastern Michigan quarterback Reggie Bell did not see any game action, but could return next week to play Western Michigan.
“Reggie wasn’t healthy, he got better everyday, could’ve played but the practice reps early on weren’t as quality as they needed to be,” said Creighton. “He’s still shaking some rust off, and Brogan had played for five games and has played well.”
“I didn’t. I didn’t know,” said Rod Carrey when asked if he knew Bell wasn’t going to play. “They kind of played that close to their chest.”
Brogan Roback went 26-of-43 and had 219-yards through the air. Roback connected with eight different receivers, Eddie Daugherty leading the way with 3-receptions for 48-yards.
Eastern Michigan will take on rival Western Michigan, Thursday night at Rynearson Stadium. The Broncos are 4-3 on the season and undefeated in the MAC at 3-0.
