By Josh Dinkelman, UNI Athletics
CHAMPAIGN, Ill.— UNI softball headed to Champaign, Illinois to round out a 21-game road stand. After falling behind early, the Panther offense rallied and took down their Big Ten opponent in eight innings by a 7-6 final score. Head coach Ryan Jacobs recorded a UNI-record 515th victory with the win.
HOW IT HAPPENED
The Fighting Illini got on the board first with a pair of runs in the bottom of the third inning to take a 2-0 lead. The Panthers responded in the very next inning with back-to-back home runs. The first home run came from Savannah Jemilo, her first hit of the 2025 season. The shot came with Addison McElrath on second base and Kylee Sanders on third to give UNI a 3-2 lead. On the very next at-bat, Kate Lappe launched her sixth home run of the season to extend UNI’s lead to two runs.
Illinois cut the Panther lead to one with a run in the home half of the fourth inning. The third Panther home run of the game came off the bat of Katelyn Callahan in the top of the sixth inning with Jemilo on base to give the Cats a three-run lead at 6-3. Three runs from the home team in the bottom of the sixth and seventh innings combined sent the matchup into extra innings.
In extras, Ava Smithson singled through the left side to score Adalyn Reynolds and give UNI a 7-6 lead. Freshman pitcher Morgan Vertz went 1-2-3 in the bottom half of the eighth inning with a foul out, a pop out, and a ground out to put the final nail in the coffin.
Both Kate Lappe and Savanna Jemilo recorded multi-hit performances with two hits each. Lappe recorded two hits and one run in four at-bats while Jemilo finished with two hits and two runs in two at-bats. She finished with a game-high three RBIs and two extra-base hits. Morgan Vertz picked up her fifth win of the season with two innings in the circle in relief. The trio of Vertz, Anna Wischnowski, and Carly Goodwin combined for five strikeouts with Wischnowski posting four punchouts.