Top 10 Husker Stories of 2025

From conference championships to national titles to news away from the playing field. Here are the top 10 stories for the Nebraska Cornhuskers in 2025.

Former Nebraska volleyball coach John Cook poses next to his statue with his successor Dani Busboom Kelly. | Nebraska Athletics

As 2025 comes to a close, it is time to look back at the year as a whole and remember what stories were the biggest for the Nebraska Cornhuskers. Below is my top-10 list for 2025.

10. Axelina Johansson

Nebraska thrower Axelina Johansson holds up her trophy for winning the NCAA Women's Indoor Shot Put National Championship on March 15, 2025. | Nebraska Athletics

Jump back to the 2024-25 season, and Axelina Johansson's domination of the sport continued with an indoor shot put national championship. That was the 2024 Paris Olympian's sixth All-America honor, and fifth time being on the first team. It was also the program's first indoor national title since 2005.

Jump to this season, which is still in its infancy after getting rolling earlier in December, and Johansson is already among the greatest ever. At the Husker Holiday Open, she threw for a mark of 19.72m (64’ 8.5”). That not only broke her own school record, but also set a new Swedish record and an NCAA record.

9. Greg Sharpe and Jack Hoffman pass away

Greg Sharpe and Jack Hoffman | Nebraska Athletics & @teamjackfoundation on Instagram

For more than a decade, two of the most recognizable people for Nebraska Athletics were a pair of folks not in uniform.

Greg Sharpe, the longtime radio voice of Nebraska football and baseball, passed away after a battle with cancer in February. The month prior saw Jack Hoffman, the namesake of the Team Jack Foundation and an ESPY Award winner for his 2013 Spring Game run, pass away after his own fights with cancer.

Before his passing, Sharpe was honored with the naming of the "Greg Sharpe Radio Booth" at Memorial Stadium.

Greg Sharpe was honored by Nebraska Athletics with the namesake "Greg Sharpe Radio Booth" at Memorial Stadium. | Nebraska Athletics

8. All-American Emmett Johnson

Nebraska Cornhuskers running back Emmett Johnson. | Gary A. Vasquez-Imagn Images

Questions in the 2024-25 offseason revolved around whether or not Nebraska would add a transfer portal running back to supplement Emmett Johnson. When that didn't happen, it became a constant curiosity about who his backup was.

As it turns out, Johnson didn't really need one.

Johnson posted the best season by a Husker running back in more than a decade. He rushed for 1,451 yards on 251 carries with 12 touchdowns, adding 46 receptions for 370 yards and three touchdowns.

A Doak Walker Award semifinalist, Johnson was named the Big Ten Conference Running Back of the Year as he earned All-America honors, including first team from several outlets.

7. Matt Rhule extension

Nebraska football coach Matt Rhule. | Kenny Larabee, KLIN

In the most chaotic year ever for the coaching carousel, Nebraska avoided the ride altogether.

Sure, Penn State never actually contacted Nebraska athletics director Troy Dannen about going after Matt Rhule, but there were enough other jobs open that had the Husker coach somewhere on their big boards. Instead, Rhule signed an extension to stay in Lincoln for two more years.

Besides the additional two years to take him through the 2032 season, which sees him earning $12.5 million in each of those years, Rhule's buyout this season increased to $15 million from $5 million. His buyout stays higher than the original contract until reaching the same number of $2 million in 2030.

6. Baseball goes back-to-back

Nebraska players hold up the trophy after winning the 2025 Big Ten Baseball Tournament. | Nebraska Athletics

After going 40-22 in 2024 and winning the Big Ten Conference title, expectations were for a similar season in 2025. Those expectations needed to be brought down after the loss of ace pitcher Mason McConnaughey to injury in March.

Instead, Nebraska limped into the conference tournament as an 8-seed and a meager 28-27 record. That put the Big Red in a group with 12-seed Michigan State and the 1-seed Oregon.

The Huskers got a gift against the Spartans, with a dropped ball in the outfield leading to an extra-inning victory. The Big Red then powered past the Ducks to reach the semifinals that same day, where they downed Penn State.

The championship was all Nebraska in a 5-0 shutout of 2-seed UCLA.

Nebraska hadn't gone back-to-back with conference titles since a three-peat of the Big 12 from 1999-2001. Will Bolt has now won three Big Ten titles, including the 2021 regular-season championship.

5. The nation's longest win streak

Nebraska Cornhuskers head coach Fred Hoiberg. | Dylan Widger-Imagn Images

The difference is real in the feeling around Nebrasketball since March. The Huskers closed the 2024-25 season on a five-game losing streak to miss the Big Ten Tournament. That sent NU out to Las Vegas for the College Basketball Crown.

Over that week in Sin City, Nebraska beat Arizona State, Georgetown, Boise State, and UCF to take some much-needed momentum into the offseason. Few could have imagined how much that momentum would actually carryover into the next season.

Nebraska raised some eyebrows with its exhibition victory over top-10 BYU. But then the winning continued with the real games. In tests against Oklahoma, New Mexico, Kansas State, Creighton, Wisconsin, and Illinois, the Big Red passed with flying colors.

Now at 13-0 on the year for the first time in program history, the Huskers carry a 17-game winning streak into a date with No. 9 Michigan State on Friday.

4. Jordy (Bahl) Frahm

Nebraska pitcher Jordy Bahl delivers against Tennessee in the first game of the Knoxville Super Regional. | Nebraska Athletics

One player doesn't make a team, but one player can make a major impact. Jordy Bahl, now Jordy Frahm since getting married earlier this year, did just that in the spring.

In that first full season as a Husker, she set single-season records for batting average, runs scored, home runs, extra-base hits, total bases, and slugging percentage, while ranking in the top 10 for hits, doubles, RBIs, hit by pitch, and pitching wins. The only player in NCAA history to have at least 23 home runs and 23 wins was named the 2025 NFCA DI Player of the Year.

That big season culminated in the program's first super regional appearance in more than a decade. Now back for one more ride, expectations are for Jordy and the Huskers to find their way to Oklahoma City for the first time since 2013 and just the third time this century.

3. Wrestling takes second at nationals

The Nebraska wrestling team poses after taking second at the 2025 NCAA Championships in Philadelphia. | Nebraska Athletics

Speaking of something not having been done in a while, Nebraska wrestling hadn't had a national champion since Jordan Burroughs in 2011. In a matter of minutes, the Huskers had two.

Ridge Lovett (149) and Antrell Taylor (157) won national titles to give Nebraska a boost in the points at the national championships. That led to a runner-up finish as a team, the best result in program history, and the fourth straight year of finishing in the top 10.

2. DBK takes over, Huskers notch a perfect regular season

The Huskers celebrated their third straight Big Ten title. | Amarillo Mullen

A Nebraska native, former Husker player, and former NU coach, Dani Busboom Kelly is everything the program could have hoped for in continuing a legacy in Lincoln.

In her first year at the helm, DBK led Nebraska to a perfect regular season and a third straight Big Ten Conference title. The run of 33 consecutive wins included 15 straight sweeps and a run of 48 straight sets.

Just days away from the transfer portal window closing, no players have announced departures. Expectations for year two of the DBK era could be even more astronomical.

1. John Cook retires

John Cook becomes emotional as he addresses why he made the decision to retire. | Amarillo Mullen

Busboom Kelly was needed in Lincoln after John Cook shocked the volleyball world with his retirement in January.

Cook won four national titles as the head coach at Nebraska and won more matches than any Division I volleyball coach this century. He went 722-103 at NU, guiding the Huskers to 12 NCAA Semifinal appearances, nine Big 12 titles, and five Big Ten titles.

In his 25 years at the helm, he helped produce five Olympians, a Honda-Broderick Cup winner, three AVCA Division I National Players of the Year, 72 AVCA All-Americans, three Academic All-Americans of the Year, 25 Academic All-Americans, and 10 conference players of the year. Nebraska volleyball student-athletes combined for 88 all-conference awards and 155 academic all-conference honors in Cook's program.

Besides national titles and All-Americans, the Cook era's legacy includes the 2023 match at Memorial Stadium, which broke the world record for attendance at a women's sporting event with 92,003.

Have a question or comment for Kaleb? Send an email to kalebhenry.huskermax@gmail.com.

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