"Their attitude in the past fortnight since the previous manager left has been first class," said Adkins, who was elevated from physiotherapist after Brian Laws and Russ Wilcox left to take charge at Sheffield Wednesday.
"This was one of our best 90 minute performances of the season.
"We showed we are a good footballing side and I think we did enough to display to our supporters we are still moving in the right direction.
"The players went out full of desire and full of passion to win the ball.
"We played with a smile on our faces and it was a terrific performance against a decent Northampton side."
The Cobblers had not lost any of their previous eight games on their travels this season, and manager John Gorman admitted the home side were good value for the the three points.
"Scunthorpe are a good team and they had us on the back foot for long spells," he said.
"Our goalkeeper was our man of the match but we felt we had weathered the storm and in the end had a couple of situations where we might even have nicked the points"