NIU Athletics
The 2026 college softball season marks the fifth year teams have been able to take advantage of instant replay to challenge a call. However, that’s not an option at every school, and Northern Illinois was saddled with a loss it may have been able to avoid after falling victim to an atrocious ruling at first base at what ended up being the final play of a game against Northwestern.
In 2008, Major League Baseball managed to rile up plenty of purists when it finally embraced instant replay and provided teams with the chance to have certain calls overturned. That ended up being a very positive development, and in 2012, the NCAA followed suit by rolling it out at the college level.
It took another decade for college softball’s Replay Era to arrive, but teams have been able to use the two challenges they get per game to ask umps to go to the monitor in a number of situations since 2022.
However, that is an option as opposed to a requirement, and when you consider softball is not a huge money-making operation for most schools, many of them have been hesitant to fork over the money required to get a replay system up and running.
That includes NIU, which came back to bite the Huskies during a recent game.
NIU’s softball coach went off on an ump who robbed her team of the chance to earn a win against Northwestern with an awful call at first base
NIU softball headed into Tuesday night sitting in second place behind Akron in the MAC standings with a 14-5 record, and the 21-12 Huskies took a break from conference play for an intrastate showdown with a 23-19 Northwestern squad that arrived in DeKalb hoping to extend a six-game winning streak.
The home team headed into the top of the seventh inning with a 4-3 lead, but the Wildcats extended the game with a couple of runs that made things 5-4 heading into the bottom of what had the potential to be the final frame.
Northwestern recorded an out before Alana Powell managed to inspire some hope with a triple, and Katy Ramage found herself facing a do-or-die situation with her teammate still 60 feet away from home after the previous batter flied out to the shortstop.
It appeared Ramage had been able to come through in the clutch, as she hit a ground ball toward third base and beat the throw to the bag at first right after Powell crossed the plate to seemingly tie things up. However, things took a very unexpected turn when first base ump Brian Treesh punched her out to bring the game to a fairly shocking end.
This was the final out of Northwestern’s 5-4 win over Northern Illinois on Tuesday night.
(NIU doesn’t have replay) pic.twitter.com/HP49txaq4w
— Justin McLeod (@justfactsmaam) April 22, 2026
NIU coach Kathryn Gleason stormed onto the field to fruitlessly protest the call before being hit with an equally pointless ejection, and it’s pretty easy to see why she was as mad as she was when you consider it was not really close at all.
NIU Athletics
Gleason declined to directly address the call in question after the game while praising the team for their “fight,” and they’ll have the chance to bounce back when they kick off a three-game series against Western Michigan in Kalamazoo on Friday.