After Building Powerhouse Program, Pettit Pleased To See Sustained Success Of Husker Volleyball

It's crazy to believe, but you could literally track the source of Nebraska's four-plus decade dominance in volleyball to a waste paper basket's contents in North Carolina.
 
It's true. At least, that's where Paul Sanderford fished a couple of fliers from his women's basketball coaching office at Louisburg College. These small handbills – one from the University of Minnesota, the other from the University of Nebraska – advertised vacant volleyball head coaching positions.
 
Sanderford gave them to the school's volleyball coach, a man named Terry Pettit.
 
Make sense now?
 
For had Sanderford not encouraged his coaching colleague, or had Minnesota been more open to hiring a male candidate, who knows if Nebraska becomes a trailblazer in volleyball? Maybe Nebraska wouldn't rank among the top three programs in NCAA history in NCAA Tournament appearances, NCAA Tournament wins and NCAA championships.
 
But it does, and Pettit is largely to thank.
 
That's why the former Nebraska volleyball coach is joining the six-year-old Nebraska Athletic Hall of Fame in September. Former coaches became eligible inductees in 2018, as Pettit joins Bob Devaney, Tom Osborne and Francis Allen.
 
"That's a good group to be with," Pettit said.
 
Until now, Pettit said his biggest recognition on campus was having the volleyball court adorned with his name. That's still big, he said. But so is this honor.
 
"It was a very pleasant surprise," said Pettit, who learned of his nomination from John Cook, who succeeded Pettit as coach in 2000, and has not only maintained the program's success, but arguably elevated it.
 
In fact, Pettit firmly believes Cook will someday be alongside in the Nebraska Athletic Hall of Fame.
 
"I'm very proud of the program. I'm very pleased to see how the program continues to develop under John Cook," Pettit said. "Sometimes it doesn't always go that way. There are no guarantees that when a program is strong and you change head coaches, that the success is going to be sustained and be better.
 
"I look at this Hall of Fame induction as it really is honoring the program. Everything John does, I benefit from. We all benefit from, the players who've been associated with the program."
 
In his 23-year career, Pettit led Nebraska to 21 conference titles and the 1995 national championship, and his recruiting played a significant role in the Huskers' 2000 national championship, the first season under Cook.
 
Pettit was a two-time national and nine-time conference coach of the year. His .820 career winning percentage (694-148-12) ranks seventh among all coaches in NCAA Division I history. In 2009, he was inducted into the American Volleyball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
 
Pettit's career began in 1974 at Louisburg College, where he was hired to teach and initially coach men's tennis and golf at the junior college. When administration saw that Pettit had played club volleyball in Chicago under Jim Coleman, the coach of the United States' 1968 Olympics men's team, they asked him to coach volleyball instead.
 
"I just assumed it was a men's team, and then I found out it was women's," Pettit said. "That first year, we didn't have anybody who'd played organized volleyball."
 
Louisburg played 10 matches that first season, and by Pettit's third season had finished in the top five in the country among junior colleges. Then came the flier exchange with Sanderford – who nearly 20 years later would coach the Nebraska women's basketball team.
 
"Minnesota made it very clear they were going to hire a female coach," Pettit said, "and Nebraska said they would interview me, but essentially I would need to drive from North Carolina to Lincoln for the interview."
 
He did, with a stop at his parents' home in Indiana along the way.
 
"The interview was pretty cool in that it was around practice," he said. "There were probably six kids there during the summer, having practice in the Coliseum."
 
By the time Pettit returned home, he received a phone call and a job offer. After a few days, he accepted, for $12,000 a year. He succeeded Pat Sullivan, the program's inaugural coach, in 1977, and joined a department that at the time was separating its men's and women's sports budgets. While athletic director Bob Devaney approved the hiring, Pettit says Dr. June Davis, the senior women's administrator, technically hired him.
 
The program competed in the AIAW then, and in Petitt's first season, only three or four players had partial scholarships. Not until his third year did Nebraska offer full scholarships, but even that put Nebraska ahead of many other programs.
 
"I was fortunate in that there was very good existing talent at Nebraska," Pettit said. "In the first two years, we had a junior varsity team, and there were players on that team that could compete at the varsity level.
 
"But it really took off when we had ability to offer full scholarships."
 
The first full scholarships for incoming freshmen went to Shandi Pettine and Terri Kanouse, with Kanouse later becoming the program's first All-American. While Nebraska churned out Big Eight Conference championships on an annual basis – 16 in a row to begin the Pettit era – the program's success and fan interest really took off when the NCAA began sanctioning volleyball in 1982.
 
"I don't think there's anything that energizes a fan base like an NCAA event," said Pettit, whose team defeated Penn State at home in the programs' first NCAA Tournament match, sparking a rivalry that exists to this day. Russ Rose, a Pettit assistant coach in 1978, became Penn State's coach in 1979 and remains at the school.


 
Pettit credited Dr. Barbara Hibner, who succeeded Davis as senior women's administrator, for her aggressiveness in bidding for NCAA events, thus creating fan interest.
 
"From 1982-2000," Pettit said, "I would guess we may have hosted as many NCAA rounds as any school in the country."
 
Nebraska played for its first national title in 1986 and won its first title in 1995. All the while, Pettit credited the success of the Nebraska football program for generating income that allowed volleyball the necessary resources to recruit and schedule.
 
"But football also had a brand that when you were recruiting someone who wasn't familiar with the university," Pettit said, "there was a good chance that maybe the dad followed football, and that opened some doors for us."
 
Now, volleyball has built its own brand and developed a fan base with national recognition. Pettit said that allowed him to expand his recruiting base, attracting the like of Greichaly Cepero from Puerto Rico and Fiona Nepo from Hawaii.
 
"Those players wouldn't have come here if we weren't a top five program," Pettit said. "When you look at John's program, the same would be true of (Lauren) Stivrins or Lexi Sun or Sarah Pavan.
 
"And if you're fortunate like I was, I had an opportunity to work for an athletic director, Bill Byrne, who really supported what we were doing. I don't mean so much financially. Dr. Hibner and Bill Byrne were emotionally engaged in the program. "
 
After the 1999 season, when Pettit hired Cook, his assistant from 1989-91, away from Wisconsin to replace longtime assistant coach Cathy Noth, Pettit, at age 54, made the difficult, soul-searching question to hand the program over to Cook.
 
"It was hard. It was very hard," Pettit said. "And it wasn't any one thing. It was several things. I didn't know how to coach without carrying it with me all the time. Each year it would take me longer to recover, physically. So that was a factor.
 
"I think when Cathy left, when you have a cohort that is so committed and is the ideal assistant for you – her strengths complemented my weaknesses. I think that had something to do with it."
 
The third factor, Pettit said, was his desire to put his MFA in creative writing to use, while also helping mentor other coaches.
 
"I kind of felt, I didn't want to wake up at 65 and think, 'Boy I never did this other thing that is a real motivating factor,' " Pettit said. "I loved Nebraska volleyball. I loved coaching Nebraska volleyball. But I also loved doing other things, and I knew I couldn't do that if I continued to coach.
 
"And I've been fortunate in that this past year I've mentored six coaches, five in volleyball and one in basketball. I get to sleep at night. I don't lose sleep over recruiting. I also have time to write and spend time with (my wife) Ann and see our family. So it's been good."
 
Pettit has also written three books – two on coaching, leadership and teambuilding, and another that's a selected group of poems. He still writes, and plans a book on a series of essays on everything from the environment to leadership to love. He also began a podcast last fall that focused on volleyball in Nebraska, not just Nebraska volleyball, that has some 15,000 downloads.
 
Suffice it to say he's had enjoyable, successful careers, and with a tossed-away flier an unlikely spark.
 
"I think the thing that pleases me the most is how former players are doing," Pettit said. "A lot of them went into coaching volleyball. A lot of them in the professional life. They seem to be doing well.
 
"They seem to be healthy people, and they stay in touch, and that's probably the most rewarding thing to happen."
 
Reach Brian at brosenthal@huskers.com or follow him on Twitter @GBRosenthal.