Wisconsin came into the NCAA tournament in 2013 having never won a game and after winning twice on Friday afternoon the Badgers faced the host Oregon Ducks with a birth in the super regionals on the line. Unfortunately, UW's luck at the plate ran out as Oregon eliminated Wisconsin from the NCAA tournament by a score of 3-0. 

UW ace Cassandra Darrah did all she could to help this team, pitching a near flawless game. Unfortunately her two mistakes cost the Badgers (44-13) dearly as she was tagged twice for home runs that produced all three runs and took the loss because of it. 

It spoiled an otherwise great pitching performance for Darrah, who went the distance - giving up just three hits, striking out five and walking just three Ducks on the day. 

On the flip side the Badger bats were silenced as well, producing just four hits of their own as the Ducks Cheridan Hawkins (a freshman) and Jessica Moore combined to hold what had been a potent Badgers offense off the board. 

Survive and advance - it's a term that we all hear often associated with playoffs in sports and it held somewhat true for Wisconsin on Friday as they stared elimination in the face twice and rather than just survive they pounced on the chances provided to them, advancing to see another day in the NCAA tournament with wins of 6-0 over BYU and 6-2 over North Carolina. 

The 6-0 win over BYU marked Wisconsin's first NCAA softball tournament win in program history. Cassandra Darrah excelled from the circle, going 6 innings while giving up just two hits and striking out four. They also got a lot of timely hitting from her teammates to advance to the nightcap and the final elimination game of the day. 

Perhaps the biggest highlight outside of Darrah's pitching performance in the opener was the three run home run from Stephanie Peace, who hit it deep to the left field bleachers to make the game 5-0 at that point. It was all the Badgers and Darrah needed to help eliminate BYU from tournament play and keep their tournament hopes alive as well. 

Fresh off celebrating the school's first ever Big Ten tournament title the Badgers found out the who, when, and where of their NCAA Tournament journey. Wisconsin was placed in the Eugene regional with host and number three seed Oregon, BYU, and North Carolina. 

In that regional UW will take on the North Carolina Tar Heels (39-19) on Thursday to open up regional play. UNC and Wisconsin will tangle for the 2nd time this season as they met in the opener of the Louisville Classic with the Badgers coming away with a 4-2 victory. 

The time and broadcast schedule (it won't be an ESPN/watchESPN game) have yet to be announced as of this writing.

North Carolina finished third in the ACC this season with a 13-8 record and are just 6-4 in their last 10 contests coming into the NCAA Tournament.

The regionals take place May 16-19 and are double elimination, meaning you are in until you lose two games.

This is just the 2nd time in the NCAA Tournament for Wisconsin, who lost in back-to-back games at the Goodman Diamond on campus to be knocked out of the 2005 tournament.

Should Wisconsin advance out of the regional round the Super Regionals are May 23-26 in a best of three series at the highest remaining seed. 

Some worried about a let down from the Badgers following their upset of Michigan on Saturday and after going down 2-0 early on it appeared that could be the case. However the Badgers rallied back and came away 9-3 winners for the 2nd straight day, earning the programs first ever Big Ten tournament title and beating rival Minnesota to do it. 

With the win Wisconsin (42-11) earned the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, returning to the national tournament for the 1st time since 2005. 

The Badgers were easily the most dominate team in the tournament and a lot of that had to do with the performance of pitcher Cassandra Darrah, who went all seven innings in the tournament final. 

Her three straight complete game W's in the tournament earned her tournament MVP honors. She was joined on the all-tournament team by freshman Steffani LaJuenesse and sophomore Maria Van Abel. 

One swing of the bat, that's all it took for UW to make the softball world stand up and take notice on their way to a 9-3 win over No. 6/8 Michigan in Saturday's Big Ten Tournament semi final. With Wisconsin up 2-0 already up stepped  pinch hitter, Steffani LaJuenesse,  and what transpired in her at bat changed the face of the game and UW's resume for the NCAA tournament.

Call it a hunch or call it dumb luck, whatever it was that made coach Yvette Healy put LaJuenesse in it worked as LaJuenesse stepped up and delivered a virtual knock out blow with a two out grand slam that made it 6-0 before the 1st inning was complete. 

Any pitcher seeing six runs of support on the board would be confident and that's exactly what Cassandra Darrah had on her way to a good outing, minus one inning. Darrah pitched a complete game, giving up 6 hits and 2 walks, while striking out four with all three runs earned.

Wisconsin softball will most likely only go as far as their pitching will take them this postseason and on Friday afternoon in Lincoln, Nebraska that was on full display as the No. 4 seed Wisconsin blanked No. 12 seed Northwestern 3-0 in a Big Ten Tournament quarterfinal. 

The Badgers got behind their star pitcher Cassandra Darrah, who tossed seven innings of shutout baseball. She surrendered just 4 hits and struck out eight Wildcat batters, while giving up just three walks to earn the win and improve her season record to 24-5. 

Darrah also got help from the Northwestern defense, who had three errors on the day and helped throw away a good enough to win performance from pitcher Amy Letourneau who allowed just three hits over six innings of work, striking out seven. 

Letourneau also contributed to her own downfall by walking six Badger batters and contributing to the defensive errors as well.

Records are made to be broken and in 2013 that's what the University of Wisconsin softball team has been all about. Well, another one fell on Wednesday morning as five Badgers softball players were named to All-Big Ten lists. 

Leading the way were first team members Whitney Massey, Cassandra Darrah, and Mary Massei. Joining them on the lists were Kendall Grimm and Meghan McIntosh, who both earned second team all-Big Ten honors. 

Also honored was Maria Van Abel, who got the team's Sportsmanship Award by the Big Ten. 

Darrah was honored as a second team All-Big Ten member last season and finished this year tied for 2nd on the single season win list in Wisconsin history with a 23-5 record and a 2.25 ERA, which was 2nd in the conference this season. 

She wasn't the only one making a return to All-Big Ten honors as Whitney Massey is making her second consecutive appearance on the first team. She led the team with 18 doubles and broke yet another record with 12 home runs. She also knocked in 24 RBI's, which was sixth in Big Ten play this year. 

Back to the pitching mound the Badgers also saw Meghan McIntosh earn honors after a season in which she was 7-3 with a 2.72 ERA in league play alone (good for 6th in the B1G), as well as an unreal .173 opponent batting average in conference play. 

The final honoree Kendall Grimm who ended the regular season .391 batting average and was 2nd on the team in hits during B1G play with 25. She was also one of the best fielders around, ending the conference season with a perfect 1.000 fielding percentage. This was her 2nd honor after being named to the first team last year. 

Paula Watkins crew finished 2012 with a 12-8-1 overall record and an even 5-5-1 in Big Ten play after scheduling a very difficult slate to prepare them for the challenge of Big Ten play. In 2013 it's a slightly different story as UW announced the Women's soccer schedule for the coming year.

Wisconsin will only face two teams out of conference that made the 2012 NCAA tournament in UCONN and Illinois State, with both games being road trips. 

In fact, road trip is the key word to the non-conference slate as UW will play it's first four games of the season on the road. After back-to-back games against UCONN and Illinois State the Badgers will head out west to take on Oregon (8-10-2, 3-7-1 Pac-12) and Oregon State (11-6-3, 3-5-3 Pac-12). 

UW will open play at the McClimon Complex on Sept. 6th against SEC foe Vanderbilt, whom Wisconsin has faced just twice in their history, holding a 1-0-1 record and winning the last meeting back in 2010 in Nashville. 

Perhaps the toughest slate of games will come when Wisconsin plays host to Penn State and Ohio State on the weekend of Oct. 4th. PSU and OSU finished 1st and 2nd last season in the Big Ten. 

Scheduling in the world of NCAA Volleyball has never been more important than it is now and in new head coach Kelly Sheffield's first season at Wisconsin he's going to challenge the Badgers with fourteen teams that made the NCAA tournament last season. 

“The non-conference schedule for us is a challenging one, no question, but one that I think will help prepare us for the Big Ten schedule,” said Sheffield. “Seven of our 12 non-conference matches are against teams that were in the NCAA tournament last year and just about every team finished in the top half of the RPI. We will be challenged every single tournament and that’s what I wanted for this team.”

Seven Big Ten teams made the tournament last season and the Badgers will also take on seven teams that made the NCAA tournament in the non-conference slate. 

Wisconsin came into Sunday needed two wins and some big time help from Penn State in order to take the No. 2 seed in the upcoming Big Ten tournament. That goal was on track after Wisconsin blanked the visiting Spartans 3-0 in the opener at Goodman Diamond. However, hope flamed out as MSU responded back with an 11-5 thrashing of UW to spoil Senior Weekend on the shores of Lake Mendota. 

The Badgers finish the regular season with a record of 39-11, setting a school record for wins in a season along the way and will have the 3rd seed in the upcoming Big Ten tournament on May 9-12 in Lincoln, NE. 

In the opener things got off to a cracking start, quite literally as leadoff hitter Marry Massei cracked a solo home run to put Wisconsin up 1-0. It was her 7th home run of the season and set the tone for UW. 

After a bit of trouble in the opening frame for Cassandra Darrah at the circle, she settled down quite a bit, getting back-to-back 1,2,3 innings in the 2nd and 3rd.