ORLANDO, Fla.—What a day it was for the Villanova and South Dakota State softball teams. The latest for both squads, as of 10:30 p.m. on Saturday night, is that they will resume play on Sunday morning at 10 a.m. with the score tied at 1-1. When play restarts, the Wildcats will be coming to bat in the top of the sixth inning with junior catcher Ally Jones (Brielle, N.J.) due up. The winner of this game will still have to face Michigan in a second straight elimination game. That next contest has a tentative start time of 11:30 a.m. at the UCF Softball Complex. Television and other details will be confirmed on Sunday morning.
 
There is a saying that truth is stranger than fiction and that theory may have been proven on a marathon second day of the Orlando Regional, a day which had its first pitch of a game between regional host UCF and Michigan thrown at 11:05 a.m., and a day which did not conclude until common sense prevailed in order to allow Villanova and South Dakota State to return to their hotels just before 10 p.m. on Saturday night.
 
The Wildcats and the Jackrabbits withstood 11 hours at the field with temperatures that felt like 100 degrees or higher for much of the afternoon. They sat through a four-plus hour winners' bracket game between the host Knights and the Wolverines which went 11 innings, moving the start of the weekend's first elimination game back by two-and-a-half hours from 1:35 p.m. to 4 p.m. Villanova played just three-plus innings against South Dakota State before a weather delay that lasted well over three hours, then was able to take the field a second time for just 26 minutes before nature again halted the proceedings.
 
Here is a key takeaway from the day which we promise doesn't involve lightning detectors, heavy rain or even long wait times. For five innings, there was some really good softball played. Villanova took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first inning, South Dakota State tied it 1-1 in the bottom of the second, and the Wildcats made several difficult defensive plays which kept the fans on the edge of their seats. Despite the adversity and the unusual playing conditions, Villanova demonstrated whey it is still playing championship softball at the end of May.
 
With the bases loaded and two outs in the bottom of the first inning, senior shortstop Megan Kern (Royersford, Pa.) made a nice catch of a hard line drive to her right to end the inning with no runs scored. Next we'll go to the bottom of the fourth inning, again with two outs and this time with nobody on when junior Chloe Smith (Sacramento, Calif.) dove to her left to stop a hard one-hopper to third base and made a perfect throw to first to end the inning. By the bottom of the fifth inning, it was graduate Paige Rauch (Windsor, N.Y.) in right field and junior Dani Dabroski (Cedar Grove, N.J.) in left field who played starring defensive roles.
 
South Dakota State had a runner at second with nobody out in the fifth when its number two hitter, Emma Osmundson, hit a ball to left field. Dabroski circled the play with winds once again starting to swirl around the outfield and finally ensnared the ball in her glove for the first out. Next up was Rozelyn Carrillo who hit a hard shot to right field that Rauch was still running for when she made a reaching, over-the-shoulder catch. The runner at second base tagged up and appeared to leave second base well in advance of the ball being caught, but she was not called out for being doubled off second base or for leaving the base early.
 
That brought up cleanup hitter and Jackrabbits home run leader Cylie Halvorson who hit the first offering from freshman Kelsey White (Taunton, Mass.) deep into left field, sending Dabroski into the muck of a rain-soaked warning track and eventually to the base of the wall where she reached up to make the catch. It was the third out of the inning, and the final out of the night.
 
Hours earlier, Villanova had the breaks going its way in the top of the first inning. Graduate Angela Giampolo (East Windsor, N.J.) led off the game at exactly 4 p.m. and was hit by the very first pitch from South Dakota State starter Tori Kniesche. Shades of a BIG EAST championship game which started in the exact same manner some seven days earlier. It was the 33^rd time in her career that Giampolo was hit by a pitch; the Wildcats all-time record is just one higher.
 
Rauch drew a six-pitch walk and Smith came to bat with two on and nobody out. Her dribbler towards third base was bobbled by Jackrabbits third baseman Cheyanne Masterson, who stayed with the play and tagged third base for a force out just before Giampolo could slide in. Kern struck out for the second out, but White extended the inning with a five-pitch walk that loaded the bases. A wild pitch with Jones at the plate scored Rauch with the game's first run. Jones worked an eight-pitch walk to load the bases a second time before Kniesche finally escaped the inning. She had walked six and struck out nine while throwing 98 pitches through the first five innings which were played in Saturday's tedium.
 
Villanova has just one hit in this game, a screaming double by Kern with one out in the top of the third which left the ball still smoldering as it caromed on a hop off the wall in right-center field. White walked on eight pitches, but a liner by Jones into left field was caught on a line and Kniesche ended a scoreless inning with a strikeout.
 
After the Wildcats were retired in order in the top of the fourth inning, four defensive changes were announced for the bottom half of the frame. White moved from right field to the circle, switching places with Rauch who pitched the first three innings. Dabroski entered the game in left field for sophomore Tess Cites (Horseheads, N.Y.), while senior center fielder Sydney Hayes (Douglassville, Pa.) reentered after being pinch hit for in the top of the inning. Before the inning could start however, lightning was detected within eight miles of the stadium at 5:19 p.m. and safety procedures were enacted to clear the field and the stadium.
 
It was still partly sunny at this point with hopes that storms in the area might steer clear of the UCF campus, but conditions ultimately deteriorated as a wind-driven thunderstorm drenched the field and its surroundings with torrential rain. The teams did not return to the field to warmup until approximately 8 p.m., with play resuming at 8:35 with White finally throwing her first pitch of the night. The next stoppage occurred 26 minutes later at 9:01 p.m. with lightning once again in the vicinity. The thought of resuming play was finally scrapped just after 9:30 when a tornado warning was issued for the immediate area.
 
Through it all, the situation has not changed for Villanova. The winner between the Wildcats and South Dakota State will next play against Michigan, which lost a four-plus hour heartbreaker to UCF in 11 innings earlier on Saturday. The host Knights scored single runs in the bottom of the sixth and seventh innings of that contest to extend the game, tying the score at 2-2 while down to their final strike in the seventh inning.
 
That next game between Michigan and the VU-SDSU winner is tentatively slated for an 11:30 a.m. start on Sunday morning. That is also an elimination game, with the winner moving on to the regional final to face UCF. The hosts are the only undefeated team of the weekend, having defeated the Wildcats on Friday afternoon (6-0) before outlasting the Wolverines on Saturday.