Knoxville Regional: Dayton vs. Miami (Ohio) softball set time to resume play

After Mother Nature made other plans, the Knoxville Regional is set to resume. Dayton and Miami (Ohio) were in the second inning of Saturday’s game when lightning entered the area, but the teams have now announced a restart time.

The matchup is expected to start back up at 7:15 p.m. ET. It was a scoreless affair to start things out, but lightning came within eight miles of Sherri Parker Lee Stadium and forced a delay.

Dayton put together an impressive regular season with a 33-20 overall record, including a 19-7 record in Atlantic 10 Conference action to become the No. 1 seed in the league tournament. The Flyers then swept all three games against UMass, Loyola Chicago and Saint Louis to lock up the A-10’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

UD went toe-to-toe with Regional host Tennessee in the tournament opener, but ultimately fell to the Volunteers 3-0. That set up an elimination game with Miami (Ohio), which had a strong showing en route to the MAC title.

The Redhawks amassed a 48-8 overall record and went 26-1 during MAC play, only losing to Central Michigan in April. They then ran the table in the conference tournament and opened the NCAA Tournament with a matchup against Virginia. However, it was all Cavaliers in that one as UVA got the 7-0 victory to advance to the 1-0 game.

As a result, Dayton and Miami (Ohio) would play a win-or-go home matchup on Saturday.

Tennessee cruises past Virginia in run-rule win

The day started out with Tennessee taking on Virginia, and the Lady Vols offense rose to the occasion. They erupted for five runs in the second inning and four more in the third en route to the 12-0 victory in five innings via run rule.

Rylie West had the biggest performance of the day for Tennessee, going 1-for-2 with four RBI – three of which came on a home run in the bottom of the third. The Lady Vols got four homers in total as part of the dominant showing, but Payton Gotshall also put on a show in the circle.

Gotshall allowed just three hits over her five innings of work, striking out five UVA hitters to get the win.

Virginia now heads to the elimination bracket and will await the winner of Dayton vs. Miami. The winner of that matchup has a date with Tennessee on Sunday in the Knoxville Regional final.