A layup is supposed to yield two easy points. Friday’s NCAA women’s basketball slate delivered two bizarre exceptions, with players in separate games accidentally putting the ball through their own team’s hoops. The mistakes handed their opponents unexpected points and left two broadcast crews struggling to process what had happened.

The first incident occurred during Northwestern State’s matchup against Arkansas. The Lady Demons were trying to break the Razorbacks’ defensive press when KP Parr inbounded the ball to Chloe Donnell. Donnell passed to Karma Wynn, who was cutting toward her own basket… and Wynn finished with an uncontested layup into the wrong hoop, handing Arkansas two points in the first quarter, according to contemporaneous reporting.

SEC Network commentators Matt Zimmerman and Brett Dolan were covering the Arkansas game. Zimmerman called out, “Oh! She scored on the wrong basket.” Dolan responded, “Oh, my goodness gracious.”

But if you thought you had seen enough for the day, you were wrong.

About an hour later, another wrong-basket layup occurred during New Mexico State’s game against Southern Utah. New Mexico State trailed 61–60 with about 20 seconds remaining when Stacy Chovino disrupted Southern Utah’s inbounds possession, allowing Emma Christiano to recover the ball and drive toward the basket in two clips shared by Talia Goodman on X. She accidentally finished at the wrong end, increasing Southern Utah’s lead to 63–60. The mistake gave the Thunderbirds a three-point cushion in the closing seconds.

The ESPN+ broadcast initially interpreted the basket as a New Mexico State score, with play-by-play announcer Adam Young calling, “Aggies lead!” Analyst Anita Maxwell Skipper quickly corrected him on air, saying, “Wrong basket. Wrong basket. She shot it in their basket.”

Young subsequently acknowledged the confusion, admitting, “That threw me for a loop, as well,” providing a second example of broadcasters struggling to process the unusual play.

The first mistake came in a game Arkansas ultimately controlled, as the Razorbacks defeated Northwestern State 89–59 by 30 points. New Mexico State’s situation was much tighter, but the Aggies still managed to recover. Despite Christiano’s mistake putting Southern Utah ahead 63–60, the Aggies erased the deficit through Chovino’s late scoring to secure a thrilling 64–63 victory.

Chovino played a major role in New Mexico State’s late-game recovery. After Southern Utah took a three-point lead, Chovino scored a layup (in the right basket) with nine seconds remaining to cut the deficit to 63–62.

Following another defensive possession, she converted the decisive basket with two seconds left to give the Aggies a 64–63 win, finishing with a career-high 25 points and eight rebounds.

The mistakes also created highly unusual entries in the digital play-by-play records. Yahoo Sports reported that ESPN’s play-by-play system described the Northwestern State incident as a team-made 80-foot shot and the New Mexico State incident as a team-made 81-foot shot. New Mexico State’s official play-by-play records the latter as a generic team basket, while Christiano’s individual box-score line shows zero points and no field-goal attempts.

The unusual mistakes have precedents in men’s college basketball as well. During the 2026 NCAA Tournament, UCF’s John Bol accidentally put the ball into his own basket while trying to secure a defensive rebound, giving UCLA a 35–31 lead. The Bruins eventually defeated the Knights 75–71.

Towson’s Solomon Uyaelunmo committed a similar error against La Salle in December 2018, scoring into his own basket after receiving an inbound pass from a teammate.

So, Friday’s games stood out for featuring two such incidents in separate women’s matchups within roughly an hour. Further, let’s try to understand the bigger picture about these players and teams.

NCAA Wrong-Basket Blunders Put Karma Wynn and Emma Christiano in the Spotlight

Karma Wynn entered the 2026–27 season as a junior guard for Northwestern State after previous stops at Tulane and Wallace State Community College. At Wallace State, she averaged 2.4 points and 2.1 rebounds per game and collected 20 rebounds across her final three games. Last night, Northwestern State’s official box score listed her with six points, four rebounds, and two assists in 16 minutes.

Northwestern State finished the 2025–26 campaign with an 18–14 overall record and a 14–8 mark in conference play, placing fifth in the standings. Following its 89–59 loss to Arkansas, the Lady Demons are scheduled to visit Oklahoma State on November 9.

Emma Christiano, meanwhile, enters her senior season with New Mexico State after spending two years at New Mexico Highlands. During the 2025–26 campaign, she appeared in all 30 games and made 18 starts, averaging 2.9 points, 2.1 rebounds and 2.7 assists per game. She also shot 37.5% from beyond the arc and recorded 1.3 steals per contest.

The Aggies are looking to improve on a difficult 2025–26 season, when they finished 9–21 overall and 5–13 in CUSA play, placing 11th in the standings. Their next scheduled game is against UTEP on November 10, giving Christiano and her teammates another opportunity to build on their narrow victory over Southern Utah.

One wrong-basket layup came during a game Arkansas won comfortably, while the other briefly put New Mexico State three points behind before the Aggies completed their comeback. Two remarkably similar mistakes, two different endings, and two broadcast crews left trying to make sense of what they had witnessed!