Nadal won the first set 6-4 and is tied 4-4 in the second set, but play has been halted because of rains.
Djokovic was happy with the rain delay, earning the reprieve he wanted after his grueling, five-set semifinal victory over Roger Federer.
Story continues below ↓advertisement | your ad hereAfter No. 3 Djokovic's win on Saturday — 3 hours, 34 minutes of exhausting tennis — he was told about the possibility of rain pushing back Sunday's final.
This marks the first three-year string of delayed finishes at the tournament since the men's and women's singles competitions were combined and played at the same site in 1935.
Nadal takes a 20-match Grand Slam winning streak to the final, having won the French Open and Wimbledon to raise his major title total to eight. A victory over Djokovic also would make the 24-year-old Nadal the first man since Rod Laver's true, calendar-year Grand Slam in 1969 to win at Paris, London and New York in the same season.
If he wins, Nadal will head to the Australian Open in January with a chance to pull off the "Rafa Slam" — four major titles in a row, something nobody has done since Laver.
The steady rain came on what was supposed to be the last day of a tournament that was threatened by Hurricane Earl during the first week, then hammered by persistent winds the second. In all, though, there was only a single, 25-minute delay over the first 13 days.
Then came Sunday. Another rainout. Another day of rest at the tournament that's considered the biggest grind of all the Grand Slams because it's the only one that schedules semifinals and finals on back-to-back days.
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