VILLANOVA, Pa.—It is finally game week for Villanova as the 2022 season is set to commence later this week another preseason honor has rolled in for graduate pitcher/utility Paige Rauch (Windsor, N.Y.). On Monday morning Softball America released its 2022 NCAA Preseason All-Americans and Rauch was selected to the third team. Entering her final year of collegiate eligibility Rauch has now been named a Preseason All-American by both Softball America and D1Softball. Last season Rauch was an NFCA third team All-American and swept the BIG EAST Player of the Year and Pitcher of the Year awards.
 
The Softball America 2022 NCAA Preseason All-Americans include the most elite Division I players in the college game at the start of the 2022 season. The first, second and third team selections are position-based.
 
The accolades for Rauch are the latest honors for a Villanova team which has set high expectations for the upcoming year. A preseason poll of BIG EAST head coaches predicted the Wildcats as the league's preseason favorite. Villanova won its first-ever conference title last season and returns 16 student-athletes from a 2021 squad which went 37-15 and advanced to an NCAA regional for the first time in program history. Last month Rauch came in at No. 21 on the Extra Elite 100 College Player Rankings released by Extra Innings Softball.
 
Rauch became the Wildcats second player ever and first in 20 years to be an NFCA All-American last season, and she was the first in BIG EAST history to be chosen Player of the Year and Pitcher of the Year in the same season. Rauch was also a first team NFCA Mideast All-Region selection a year ago, a first team All-BIG EAST honoree and the Most Outstanding Player at the BIG EAST Championship.
 
Rauch is already the Villanova career leader in batting average (.426), on-base percentage (.539), slugging percentage (.844), OPS (1.383), home runs (39) and walks (97). She also holds the single-season records in each of those categories, along with breaking a 20-year-old school record last season when she threw nine shutouts in 29 starts. Rauch batted .417/.546/.709 as a senior in 2021 and went 21-4 with a 2.12 ERA and 189 strikeouts in the circle.
 
Throughout her collegiate career Rauch has been as consistent as she has been dominant. She played her freshman season at Fordham in 2018 before transferring to the Wildcats, and since coming to Villanova has earned BIG EAST weekly recognition a whopping 23 times in the past three seasons. That includes being the league's Player of the Week on two occasions, the Pitcher of the Week eight times and a selection to the weekly BIG EAST Honor Roll a total of 13 times.
 
Rauch has consistently earned national recognition for her efforts on the field. After the 2020 season was halted midway through the season at the start of the COVID pandemic, Softball America selected Rauch as a third team Shortened Season All-American and listed her at No. 25 on its Shortened Season Top 100 list.
 
Villanova begins the 2022 season on Friday with the first of three days of action in the Buzz Classic hosted by Georgia Tech.