The Volts scored a convincing seven-wicket win against Wellington in Queenstown on Saturday, taking them to the top of the HRV Cup table with Auckland and Canterbury.
On the other hand, the Stags have been watching rather than playing after their past two games were rained out in New Plymouth.
Otago now has the chance to take sole ownership of first place, as Auckland and Canterbury do not do battle until tomorrow.
Otago is on 10 points while Central is just two points back as the halfway mark in the competition looms. Nelson has had plenty of rain lately and showers are forecast for the top of the South Island tonight.
Otago has made no changes to its side which beat Wellington and should have some degree of confidence after a solid and professional performance.
Its bowlers found the mark most of the time while its batsmen peppered the boundary rope with regularity.
Zimbabwe captain Brendan Taylor probably spent the remainder of the year trying to work out how he ended up on the losing side on Saturday.
The right-hander gave a masterful display for Wellington, whacking a four from the last ball in the innings to post his maiden twenty/20 century.
He batted with poise and balance and mixed aggression with a sound technique to score 101 from 58 deliveries and help his side reach 170 for three.
He also shared in an unbeaten stand of 124 for the fourth-wicket with Wellington captain Grant Elliott (49 not out).
But Otago strolled to a comprehensive seven-wicket in front of a good crowd of 2225.
The win was built on the back of a fantastic team effort which you could put down to some tight bowling in the opening exchanges and a superb chase anchored by Aaron Redmond.
Redmond would have been relieved to get among the runs.
He has had a lean run this summer but his 48 from 42 deliveries provided the platform from which Otago launched its assault.
Dimitri Mascarenhas, who was promoted to open, provided some fireworks with a hard-hit 41 off 25 and Brendon McCullum whacked 36 from 20.
Craig Cumming and Neil Broom combined to dispatch Andy McKay for five fours in his final over. That sealed a confidence boosting win before today's twenty/20 match against Central Districts in Nelson.
A lot of the groundwork, though, was done by bowlers.
James McMillan and Mascarenhas picked up an early wicket each and bowled tight spells.
Nick Beard got clobbered for 25 in the 15th over with Taylor and Elliott well set by that stage. But he helped pin Wellington down with some economic overs early and nicked out the dangerous James Franklin for 10.
Otago coach Vaughn Johnson labelled the win "clinical" and welcomed Redmond's return to form.
"I'm very pleased with the way we delivered in everything we did," he said.
"It was very, very pleasing to see Aaron get some runs. I thought he controlled the innings nicely and obviously Jimmy [James McMillan] bowled well at the top." Otago has been struggling with the ball in twenty/20 and adopted a different strategy on Saturday.
Mascarenhas bowled all four of his allotted overs consecutively and McMillan bowled three of his four as Wellington battled to get any traction.
The boundary rope was brought in a good 5m or so which made for shorter boundaries than customary at the venue.
With Wellington's three-pronged spin attack of Muttaih Muralidharan, Jeetan Patel and Luke Woodcock, Otago felt it was to its advantage if the rope came in. Ironically, the home side would have probably nabbed two or three catches had the rope remained in its original spot.
The only aspect of the game Johnson had cause to complain about was the last six overs.
Taylor and Elliott were seeing the ball well and added 84 runs, effectively doubling the team total from 86 for three.
"That is the nature of twenty/20 cricket and we do have some more work to do in that area, don't worry about that. We are working on it every game but can start gradually ticking the boxes.
"I guess we were about 50% today in terms of our yorkers. We have to get that percentage up."
Otago v CD Nelson, 5pm, today.
Otago: Brendon McCullum (captain), Aaron Redmond, Neil Broom, Craig Cumming, Nathan McCullum, Jimmy Neesham, Dimitri Mascarenhas, Derek de Boorder, Neil Wagner, Nick Beard, James McMillan, Craig Smith.
Central Districts: Jamie How (captain), Peter Ingram, Ross Taylor, Mathew Sinclair, Jacob Oram, Kieran Noema-Barnett, Kruger van Wyk, Doug Bracewell, Michael Mason, Tarun Nethula, Adam Milne, Bevan Small.
