Huskers Begin Journey With Nebraska Invitational

The No. 5 Nebraska volleyball team opens the 2015 regular season with the Nebraska Invitational at the Bob Devaney Sports Center this weekend.

The Huskers will host Tulsa on Friday night at 7 p.m. in the season opener. NU will then play Grand Canyon at Noon and Pittsburgh at 7 p.m. on Saturday. Each team will play three matches in the round-robin tournament. Nebraska’s matches will not be televised but will be streamed online at BTN2GO.com with a BTN Plus subscription.

Saturday’s matches are split into two sessions, a 10 a.m./Noon session and 5 p.m./7 p.m. session. Fans will have to clear the arena between the Noon and 5 p.m. matches and re-enter with a separate ticket for the evening session. Doors open 60 minutes before matches not involving Nebraska, and 90 minutes before Husker matches. New this year, a shuttle bus will transport students to and from the arena. The shuttle will run 90 minutes before Husker matches and will run every 20 minutes, making stops at the same locations as for basketball.

Nebraska Head Coach John Cook enters the 2015 season three wins away from number 600 for his career. Cook is 597-131 entering his 23rd season as a head coach. With three wins, he will become the 15th active Division I head coach to reach 600 career wins.

Experienced Huskers Set for 2015
One year after rolling out the youngest team in school history, the Nebraska volleyball team enters 2015 with an experienced group that has been to three straight NCAA regional finals. The Huskers had just one senior last season but have four this year. Additionally, the Huskers have three juniors who have started nearly every match the past two seasons.

Junior outside hitter Kadie Rolfzen is a two-time All-American and All-Big Ten selection who recorded 3.55 kills per set last season. Senior outside hitter Kelsey Fien is also coming off All-Big Ten honors after 3.21 kills per set last year. Junior libero Justine Wong-Orantes is the first player to lead the Huskers in digs as both a freshman and a sophomore after recording 3.85 per set last year. Sophomores Annika Albrecht and Sydney Townsend are back after solid freshman seasons in the back row. NU has great depth at middle blocker with seniors Meghan Haggerty and Cecilia Hall, as well as junior Amber Rolfzen in the fold.

The Huskers are reloading at setter, where sophomore Kelly Hunter takes the reins after redshirting last season. Hunter was the nation’s top high school setter in 2012-13 by PrepVolleyball.com and played in 16 matches as a freshman in 2013. She and senior outside hitter Alicia Ostrander will captain the 2015 squad. Outside hitter Olivia Boender is ready to step on the court for the Big Red after redshirting in her first year at NU.

Talented Newcomers Join the Fray
NU welcomes one of the nation’s top recruiting classes, including outside hitter Mikaela Foecke (West Point, Iowa), the No. 2 overall prospect by PrepVolleyball.com, and Kenzie Maloney (Louisville, Ky.), the publication’s top-ranked libero. Setter Brooke Smith (Weatherford, Texas) and middle blocker Tiani Reeves (Gothenburg, Neb.) also come highly acclaimed, though Reeves is set for a redshirt season. Junior middle blocker Briana Holman, a first-team All-American at LSU and January transfer, must sit out 2015 without her scholarship release from LSU.

Scouting Tulsa
Tulsa went 22-9 last season and 14-6 in the American Athletic Conference. The Golden Hurricane return their libero and four starters, including Erica Bohannon, a first-team All-AAC outside hitter last season with 4.03 kills per set. Tulsa is led by second-year coach Ryan Wills, a 2008 graduate of Tulsa. Former Husker Megan Pendergast is an assistant coach.

Scouting Grand Canyon
Grand Canyon, in its third year of transition to Division I, went 21-11 last year and 6-8 in the WAC. The Antelopes welcome back four starters, led by outside hitter Natalie Tardy, the 2014 WAC Freshman of the Year (3.44 kills per set). Kris Naber is in her 21st year leading the Antelopes. She is a 1991 graduate of Grand Canyon.

Scouting Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh posted a 25-6 overall record last season with a 13-5 mark in ACC play. The Panthers have three starters back. Middle hitter Amanda Orchard leads the way, as she garnered first-team All-ACC and honorable-mention All-America accolades in 2014 after averaging 2.11 kills per set and 0.85 blocks per set. Dan Fisher, a 1999 Pacific graduate, is in his third year as head coach. He guided the U.S. Women’s National Team to the Pan American Games title in Toronto in July.

Huskers Enter Season Ranked No. 5
Nebraska is ranked tied for fifth in the preseason AVCA Coaches Poll. Nebraska tied Wisconsin with 1,275 points to share the No. 5 spot, the Huskers’ best ranking in the poll since Oct. 29, 2012. The Huskers are scheduled to play 11 of their 30 matches against teams ranked in the preseason top 25, including eight against teams ranked in the top 14. Nebraska also has five more matches scheduled against teams receiving votes. The Huskers have now been ranked in each of the AVCA’s 479 all-time polls, dating back to 1982, joining Stanford as the only teams to be ranked in every poll. Nebraska has been ranked in the top 10 in 426 of those 479 polls, the second-highest total of any team in the country.

Nebraska Picked Second in Big Ten Preseason Poll
The Huskers were picked to finish second by the Big Ten coaches in the conference’s preseason poll. Kadie Rolfzen and Kelsey Fien were named to the 14-member preseason All-Big Ten Team. Both were All-Big Ten performers in 2014, while Rolfzen was a third-team AVCA All-American for the second straight season with Fien earning honorable mention.

Ostrander and Hunter Named 2015 Captains
Senior outside hitter Alicia Ostrander and sophomore setter Kelly Hunter were selected team captains for the 2015 season. Ostrander enjoyed a breakout role in 2014 with 2.49 kills pet set. After the volleyball season, she will join the Nebraska women’s basketball team for their season. A standout at both sports at Gordon-Rushville High School, Ostrander practiced with both teams over the summer. Hunter, a highly touted recruit out of Papillion, Neb., will take over the setter reins after redshirting in 2014 while Mary Pollmiller finished out her career.

2015 Television Schedule Announced
The Nebraska volleyball team will make at least 13 television appearances in 2015. The Huskers are officially set to make six national TV appearances, with the possibility of a seventh likely. Nebraska will appear on the Big Ten Network at Penn State (Oct. 2), vs. Michigan State (Oct. 7), at Illinois (Oct. 17) and at Purdue (Nov. 4). The Oct. 24 home match against Wisconsin falls on a BTN Wildcard selection date and is likely to be televised. Nebraska’s matches against Texas and Oregon at the VERT Challenge in Austin, Texas on Sept. 4-5 will air on the Longhorn Network. NET Television will also continue its coverage of Nebraska volleyball in 2015 with at least four broadcasts. The in-state network will air home matches against Michigan (Oct. 10), Minnesota (Oct. 23), Rutgers (Oct. 30) and Maryland (Oct. 31). The final three home matches of the regular season – Indiana (Nov. 18), Illinois (Nov. 25) and Penn State (Nov. 28) – are set to be televised by either BTN or NET, which will be determined at a later date.

Huskers Traveled the Globe in Summer 2015
A few Huskers spent their summers traveling the globe playing competitively. Justine Wong-Orantes was selected to the first ever B1G Foreign Tour Team and played matches with other Big Ten student-athletes in Croatia, Slovenia and Italy in June. The team also participated in community service initiatives and toured European cities.

Briana Holman was selected to the U.S. Collegiate National Team and competed at the World University Games in Gwangju, South Korea in July. It was her second time competing with the U.S. CNT, as she took part in the Tour of China in 2014. Holman had 18 kills in the tournament with two blocks and two aces, as the U.S. CNT finished ninth overall.

Alicia Ostrander took part in the U.S. Collegiate National Team round-robin tournament at the USA Volleyball Girls’ Junior National Championships in June. Ostrander’s CNT Blue Team was the tournament champion with a perfect 3-0 record. Ostrander tallied 31 points in the three matches.

Husband, Wife Duo Join Husker Coaching Staff
Chris Tamas is in his first season as a Husker assistant coach, while his wife, Jennifer (Joines) Tamas, is a volunteer assistant. The two came to NU in May from Cal Poly, where they spent the past two seasons in the same roles. Both Chris and Jen are former U.S. National Team captains. Chris was a first-team AVCA All-American in 2003 at Pacific, while Jen was the Big West Conference Player of the Year in 2003 at Pacific.

New Video Board at Devaney to Enhance Fan Experience
The Bob Devaney Sports Center has a new and improved look for the 2015 season. As part of an effort to enhance the fan experience, the University of Nebraska Athletics Department and Husker volleyball program installed a new center-hung video scoreboard and new sound system over the summer. The high-definition video board by Daktronics hangs directly over the center of the Devaney Center court. The board is trapezoidal in shape and is 13-feet, six-inches tall and 28-feet wide on the two sides. The ends of the board are 13-feet, two-inches wide on top and nine-feet, five-inches wide on bottom.

Former Huskers Capture Gold With Team USA
Three former Huskers - Jordan Larson-Burbach, Kelsey Robinson and Kayla Banwarth - captured gold medals at the FIVB World Championship and FIVB World Grand Prix in the last calendar year. The World Championship in Italy last October was the first major gold medal for the U.S. Women’s National Team. The USA followed up by winning gold at the World Grand Prix at the CenturyLink Center in Omaha in July. Robinson was named the tournament’s best outside hitter.