It was one of those shake-your-head-in-disbelief moments when the Nebraska volleyball team won the second set during its three-set win against Penn State on Friday at the Devaney Sports Center.
Penn State had led that set 22-15 before Nebraska roared back by winning 10 of the final 11 points of the set.
Later, the reaction was that your eyes popped out of your head in amazement after hearing what coach John Cook said about how Nebraska had played in the first set during No. 11 Nebraska’s 25-14, 25-23, 25-23 win against No. 15 Penn State.
“That first (set) was one of the best (sets) I’ve seen in 20 years of how we played,” Cook said. “I mean, we were almost flawless. … That was some high-level volleyball going on.”
And it’s on that note that the Huskers will head into the final week of the regular season, and they'll do so with a Big Ten title still on the table.
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Friday’s win in front of a standing-room-only crowd of 8,357 allowed Nebraska (20-6, 14-3 Big Ten) to stay in a first-place tie with Wisconsin in the Big Ten standings with only eight days left in the regular season.
Nebraska won’t play again this week, after Saturday’s match against Rutgers was canceled due to several non-COVID-19 related illnesses in the Rutgers program. The Huskers will receive a forfeit win.
Next week the Huskers play No. 5 Wisconsin and No. 6 Purdue.
“We’re going into a week where we control the destiny of how this Big Ten season ends,” said Husker captain Nicklin Hames. “We can win it all.”
Penn State must not like to see Nebraska as the next team on the schedule anymore. This makes four straight wins against Penn State for Nebraska, including two this season.
Entering its matches against Nebraska this season, Penn State had winning streaks of six and four matches, only to see those streaks end against the Huskers.
This is the Penn State program coached by the legendary Russ Rose, who once won four straight national championships. But Nebraska has won 11 of the last 12 matches in the series.
Nebraska hadn't swept Penn State though since 2017.
Madi Kubik led the Huskers against Penn State for the second time this season, finishing with 12 kills on Friday. Lauren Stivrins had another great match at Devaney on her super-senior night, finishing with six kills, a season-high seven blocks and one ace serve.
Lexi Sun added eight kills. Husker middle blocker Kayla Caffey had seven kills with a .636 hitting percentage. And she had two of Nebraska’s final three kills of the match as Nebraska rallied to win the close third set.
Right-side hitter Whitney Lauenstein came off the bench midway through the second set in place of Lindsay Krause. The freshman from Waverly had kills on each of her first four attempts of the match, and finished with five kills and two blocks.
Nebraska topped Penn State in kills (42-30), blocks (10-7), digs (56-50) and ace serves (4-1). Nebraska's strong serving slowed down star middle blocker Kaitlyn Hord in a big way (five kills on .125 hitting).
Nebraska's defense, with some amazing digs, held Penn State to just .088 hitting. Two of Penn State’s three worst hitting matches of the season are against Nebraska.
Why was Cook so impressed with the first set? Well, Penn State didn't get a kill until the 15th rally of the match. And late in the set, Penn State still only had three kills.
Nebraska had 13 kills. And Nebraska’s defense had 17 digs and four blocks, limiting the Penn State attack to a negative hitting percentage. The Huskers got sideouts on 14 of 15 attempts.
The second didn’t start as well as the first. It was pretty bad, actually, with Nebraska hitting around .000 early in the set.
But it was a very impressive finish to the set for the Huskers. Penn State led 22-15 and was just a few points from tying the match. But Nebraska won 10 of the final 11 points of the second set, winning the set 25-23 and taking a 2-0 match lead.
“I think I remember us talking about, ‘Hey, we’re not losing this set,’” Hames said. “I think we just found a way to come back and win those long rallies and will those points. … The crowd got into it, and it’s really hard to play in Devaney when the crowd gets going, so they helped out a lot tonight. I’m just super-proud of how composed we stayed toward the end of that second set.”
Nebraska ended the set on a 6-0 run. Hames, a 5-foot-10 setter, had a big solo block of all-conference outside hitter Erika Pritchard to pull the Huskers within one point.
“Honestly, when I blocked it I had to take a second because I didn’t think it happened,” Hames said. “I thought maybe it ended up on our side. But then I was like, ‘No, I blocked that.’ So then I turned around and I got hyped and said a few choice words that I shouldn’t repeat.”
The players on the Nebraska bench explode after Hames' block, rushing toward the edge of the court. The Huskers’ defense had gotten to Penn State at the end of the set, with one of Penn State’s best players, Jonni Parker, hitting long on the final two points.
So Cook walked to the locker room with a bounce in his step and the Huskers leading 2-0. Ten minutes earlier, he had called a timeout with the Huskers trailing big.
“I called my second timeout,” Cook said. “I wanted to settle them down. I gave them a couple of things that we got to start doing, thinking for the next (set). One of them was passing.
“And then they just caught fire. You could just feel the whole momentum shift. Our crowd was really into it. Nicklin made a great one-on-one block. Lauren got a big stuff block. And then they made a couple of hitting errors. That’s what great defense does to hitters. They just start making errors.”
In the third set, Nebraska trailed again. But the Huskers finished strong again, winning the final two points. Sun, a super-senior who recently spent a few weeks out of the starting lineup, served an ace on match point.