Husker Volleyball adversity helped beat Texas, prepare for Final Four

Nebraska Volleyball has been “through the wringer” this season, as six-year senior Lauren Stivrins said after the No. 10 Huskers defeated No. 2 Texas in Austin in the regional final.

“We kind of had a lot of trial and error and things that didn’t really go our way,” Stivrins said, “But all of it has led us to where we are and how we’ve grown.”

In spite of a rollercoaster season, Nebraska prevailed and will be playing No. 3 Pittsburgh on Thursday in the Final Four and is one game away from their sixth national championship.

The trials started In the fall when the Huskers added six talented freshmen to their squad. Three freshmen started against the Longhorns in the Elite Eight including Lindsay Krause and Ally Batenhorst, who hit .500 and .406 respectively.

Freshman Lexi Rodriguez came to Lincoln and replaced Kenzie Knuckles, who had been the libero for two seasons, as NU’s libero. Rodriguez had 20 digs in Nebraska’s regional finals victory.

During the preseason, Husker Head Coach John Cook constantly mixed up the lineup to find the perfect group of starters. Krause was named the starting right-side hitter over freshman Whitney Lauenstein and Batenhorst earned the starting role over All-American Lexi Sun.

Both Krause and Batenhorst were benched throughout the season but came up big when the Huskers needed them against Texas in a packed Gregory Gym.

“They’ve really progressed as the season has gone on,” Cook said. “They’ve been in tough situations and for them to perform when it matters most, it just shows they’ve bought in to everything we’ve been doing and trusted our training and trusted everything we’ve been talking and teaching and we got great results.”

During the trial and errors period of the preseason, the Huskers lost three consecutive games to ranked opponents (Utah, Stanford and Louisville). Cook said after the Louisville match that he was worried about how his team would play in the Big Ten after three difficult losses.

Fast forward three months and Nebraska finished second in the conference after winning the first 10 games but lost four of the last ten. Within that last half, the Huskers lost nine matches by two points to Wisconsin, Minnesota and Ohio State.

“Since then we’ve been talking about how to win close games and how to come back from those,” Cook said. “I think that was a great training lesson for us, being so close and not finishing out. Sometimes you learn more from your losses than wins and I really think, now sitting here after (beating Texas), I think that was the key for us to understand how to hang in there and be tough.”

Cook said he felt this team is prepared to do well in the tournament because they were “battled-tested” in the Big Ten which had four teams in the Elite Eight and two in the Final Four.

Teams that go through a lot of adversity have their culture is tested. The Huskers’ culture passed the test.

That was clear as Sun, a six-year senior who lost her starting role, ran into the dogpile after Nebraska took down the No. 2 seed. She hugged her teammate, Madi Kubik, who now holds Sun’s position, and said “I am so proud of you.”

Husker setter and team captain Nicklin Hames said Nebraska’s mentality in the match against the Longhorns, who defeated them 3-1 in the 2020 Elite Eight, was to be bulletproof.

“I think you have to have that mindset in those big games because they are going to make great plays and you just got to move on and go to the next play,” Hames said. “They’re gonna have great swings and go on runs, but we can out-team them and just bounce back from those.”

Texas made big runs towards the end of the second and fourth sets but the Huskers stuck it out and won both games, one by two points. They did that by using their training to finish close matches and banning together as a team.

“Everyone stepped up in this game,” Hames said. “It wasn’t perfect, but it was our way and we had each other’s backs. We out-hearted and out-teamed to them.”