Rockets can’t hold on

The University of Toledo men’s basketball team came up short in a 71-66 thriller to Northern Illinois in Savage Arena Tuesday night.

Senior Nathan Boothe and Junior Jonathan Williams combined for 51 points in the loss with 30 and 21 points respectfully.

Boothe was just a rebound shy of his seventh double-double on the season. The 6-9 center started the game off 0-4 from the field but finished strong knocking down 10 of his next 12 shots.

“At first I was settling,” said Boothe. “But coaches kept telling me to go to the basket to get yourself going and once I did that I was able to get in a rhythm.”

The Rockets (10-6, 1-2 MAC) bench was outscored 24-8 and for the first time this season UT finished the game with more turnovers than assists.

“The ball stuck too much and we got too lazy at times,” Boothe said.

The Rockets finished the game with 16 turnovers to just 13 assists, a combination that just won’t work according to head coach Todd Kowalczyk.

Toledo had no answer for NIU senior guard Travon Baker who finished the game with 23 points on 5 of 10 shooting from three-point land.

Joining him in double figures for the Huskies was redshirt sophomore center Maric Marin and freshman guard Marshawn Wilson. Marin finished with 16 points and 12 rebound in route to his seventh double-double on the season.

The Freshman finished 4 of 5 from the field with 10 points in 17 minutes of play.

The back and forth game saw 12 ties and 15 lead changes before NIU held on in the remaining minute to capture its 14th win of the season.

Toledo jumped on the scoreboard first with a lay-up by Williams in the first eight seconds of the game.

The lead would be short lived with the Huskies going on a 12-4 run. Baker knocked down back to back threes to give NIU its largest lead of the half, 12-5, with 15:18 left in the first half.

“We didn’t come out the gate with the same intensity as them and it hurt us,” said Williams.

Toledo fought back to take a one-point lead after a pair of Williams 3’s with just under ten minutes to play.

Both teams traded baskets for the rest of the half with no team gaining a lead larger than seven for the rest of the quarter.

The Huskies took a 34-32 half time lead after Aaric Armstead banked his shot in with the time expiring.

UT started the second half with six straight points to take a 38-34 lead but NIU quickly erased that, going on a 7-0 run to obtain a 41-38 advantage in the opening minutes of the second half.

Down two with just under 13 minutes remaining, the Rockets went on an 8-0 run jumping out to its largest lead of the game 52-46 after a pair of Williams free throws.

Baker stopped the run with his third trey of the night to stop the bleeding and cut the Toledo lead to 52-49.

Baker was done from three-point land knocking back to back treys to cut tie things up at 57 with 5:11 remaining in the game.

The two continued to throw blows back and forth like a pair of heavy weights with five lead changes over the next four minutes but Toledo was unable to finish, falling short in the final minute as the Huskies went on an 8-2 run to close the game out.

The Rockets had a chance late but turned the ball over three times in the last 33 seconds of the game.

“We made too many mistakes down the stretch and it ended up hurting us,” said Kowalczyk.

Toledo will return to action when they take on Akron on Friday at 7 p.m. in Savage Arena.