Warren Central’s players stood outside their dugout in the dwindling daylight Tuesday evening, wondering if they were going to play more softball.

When the lights finally came on a few minutes later, the Lady Vikes turned them out on Northwest Rankin.

Cookie Johnson’s RBI single keyed a three-run third inning that propelled WC to a 4-1 win. Brittany Fuller held Northwest Rankin in check the whole way, allowing four hits and four walks while striking out eight.

The game was delayed for about 10 minutes at the end of the third inning by a power outage. The outage had actually occurred about three hours earlier and the game started on time, but by then there wasn’t enough daylight left to play.

Umpires were ready to call the game when the lights came back on and play resumed.

“Luckily, we had a good connection with one of our parents who works for the power company,” WC coach Lucy Young said. “He was anticipating we were going to get the lights back on. The officials were a little antsy to me, but they stayed with us and said let’s just do it like a rain delay.

“They gave us 10 minutes, and luckily in those 10 minutes the power came back on,” Young added with a chuckle.

By then, the Lady Vikes had staked themselves to a 4-0 lead.

Tiffany Fuller reached on an error and scored on a wild pitch in the first inning and WC batted around in the bottom of the third to score three runs.

Johnson’s base hit with two runners on made it 2-0 and ignited the rally. Lauren Anderson followed with an RBI fielder’s choice and Shawn Johnson finished things with a bases-loaded walk.

The outburst was a welcome sight for Young, who has watched her team struggle to string hits together recently.

“Their pitcher walked some people, but we were heads up on the bases and got a few hits. It’s kind of coming back,” said Young, whose team avenged a loss to the Lady Cougars earlier in the season.

Northwest Rankin got on the board in the fourth, scoring a single run to cut it to 4-1. But Brittany Fuller buckled down from there and retired 12 of the last 14 batters she faced. Northwest Rankin didn’t have a hit or a runner advance past second base after the fourth inning.

“It seemed like when the lights came back on we turned on with them and played a little better ball. But I think it was too little, too late,” Northwest Rankin coach Reynolds Moore said.