Nebraska Volleyball's Dominating 2025 Season Like This Isn't Normal

With a maximum of three matches left in Nebraska volleyball's 2025 season, the team is peaking ahead of another potential run to the Final Four. Has this level of dominance been a surprise?

Nebraska 2025 season has been dominant from start to finish. Is it a surprise? | Kenny Larabee, KLIN

On this week's Saturday Morning Coffee Show, Jack Mitchell and Josh Peterson welcomed the two hosts of Volleyball State, Jeff Sheldon and Lincoln Arneal, onto the podcast to dive into the 2025 Nebraska volleyball season. Has this level of dominance been a surprise? Are there weaknesses other teams could exploit?

They discussed those topics and more. Below is a lightly edited transcript of select conversations from the episode.

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“Enjoy this dominance”

Josh: I don't think that any of us are surprised that we are now chatting on December the 13th and the program sits one win away from another Final Four. But just kind of going big picture first, are you shocked at all by the domination that this program and this particular team has been able to show now for three-plus months running? Where they're barely dropping any sets. Has it shocked you at all?

Dani Busboom Kelly, Bergen Reilly, and the rest of the Nebraska volleyball team has ran through competition at every step of the way. | Kenny Larabee, KLIN

Jeff: What we've seen pop up in the last couple of weeks is the saying “this match could have been an email.” It's sort of become a running joke with Nebraska volleyball. I mean, just in my opinion, yeah, I think it is surprising because you don't really see this level of dominance in 2025 when the talent is a little bit more spread out than it was maybe 15, 20 years ago. And the athleticism is just so good in the women's college volleyball game.

For one team to kind of do this is really, really impressive. And kind of the thing that I know sounds crazy when talking about it, and I talk about it on the show with Lincoln, too, there are still kind of areas of Nebraska's game where you think they can get better. You're like, “Eh, you know, this part wasn't super strong,” or “Man, I think, you know, they could go to another level if this player did a little bit better.” And then you turn around, you look at the score and they hold Kansas to the lowest score that's ever been totaled in a Sweet 16 match, and you sound insane. Because it was like 12, 11, 12 last night and Kansas didn't really look ready for prime time, but Nebraska kind of makes a lot of teams look that way.

Lincoln: [sarcastically] Nebraska's outside hitters; none of them hit above .300 last night. So they really need to shape up and really step up their game a little bit, too.

But to go to your question, Josh, I'm not that surprised. I was really high on this Nebraska team as well too. It's the level of dominance that's maybe a little surprising, but for Nebraska to be in this position, I fully expected it to, and it's fun to watch.

Nebraska's two wins over Penn State, including the second match in Lincoln, showed the level of play this group could rise to. | Dylan Widger-Imagn Images

So I think that's one thing that Jeff and I have also talked about all season, is enjoy this dominance because it's not very often that a team of this caliber comes along. Nebraska started the year strong with very big wins against Pittsburgh and Stanford, but I think that Penn State match you saw on that first Friday of October when a similar score to completely beat down a hobbled defending national title champion. But you saw what Nebraska can do when they're locked in and really focused on doing what they do well. And we've seen that several times this year, including a little bit of it last night against Kansas. So, it's impressive what they can do.

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Nebraska volleyball is a story of what you hope for from higher education

Jack: I've got a question that I don't want it to go into a place where you know that's uncomfortable, so I'll try and ask it in the best possible way. I think we know based on the personalities, the social media, and everything on this team, there are some players on this team that wouldn't otherwise probably be close for a lot of reasons. And there have been discussions about that.

Rebekah Allick been outspoken about what she believes. Harper Murray, to some degree, has. And then you got [geography]; all kinds of different things, which you have on any college team. But I think there have been people trying to even say this year; people have been at our mentions Josh. Like, “hey why aren't you talking about the rift?” Right? “Why aren't you?” And I'm sure you guys have had way more of that than we have. The thought is still there when people think and talk about this team.

The relationship between Rebekah Allick and Harper Murray has been debated throughout the season among fans. Yet, it hasn't seemed to affect Nebraska at all on the court. | Amarillo Mullen

And again, I don't want to go into that necessarily, but I haven't ever seen anything that looks like [that]. In fact, I've seen like just the opposite, which I think is always a fascinating thing about college sports generally. There isn't really a lab like that in many other places where you combine different geographic backgrounds, different races, different politics, different upbringings together, and then they've got a function like that. I mean, it really doesn't happen many other places.

Lincoln: Where else are you going to get an Italian who's with a girl from rural Colorado?

Jack: Different countries even, yeah.

Lincoln: And I think Jack, to go to this point, go watch Harper Murray's TikToks that she put out this week, where she gifted her teammates all this free swag from Adidas. Harper is genuinely nervous before giving all of her teammates this free stuff because it means so much to her that she really does appreciate her work. And then just the pure joy that these young women are showing each other for Adidas shoes and luggage. 

The connection that this team has, again, it goes back to my kind of premise of Dani [Busboom Kelly] building this foundation of joy and trust and happiness, that really kind of infiltrated every aspect of this program.

Jeff: You know, to me, this is one the best parts about college, whether it's college sports or not. The importance of higher education is you get to bring these people from different places and different backgrounds and put them together, whether it's on a volleyball team or a basketball court or just a classroom, to be exposed to different ideas and different kinds of people. How boring would our lives be if everyone we knew thought the same way and believed the same things and have the same experiences? There’s enough of that in the state of Nebraska right now.

Dani Busboom Kelly has had a huge impact on this year's Nebraska team. | Amarillo Mullen

And so I think it's a wonderful thing that you have someone from place A and place B who have a different set of beliefs, maybe. And maybe they could talk about him and understand each other and realize that they're still all on the same team and love each other. Work for the common goal. That's kind of the whole point of higher education and I wish more people valued that.

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Are they real concerns for why Nebraska can't win a national title?

Josh: How many things can you actually name that you believe in in terms of why they won't win a national championship?

Jeff: I mean, everyone's gotta be healthy, right? And this is cold and flu season. And I sometimes worry that a really good serving team can make it hard for Nebraska to get in system to set their middles. Nebraska did a great job of serving Kansas [Friday] night, but you know, they're not going to be the team that strings up the most aces. So if you run into a team like Kentucky or Texas with excellent pin hitters or Wisconsin, and Nebraska allows the other team to be in system, you know, that could be a problem.

And I just think Nebraska's pin hitters have to be more terminal and, and it sounds insane, right? For a team that hit .450, but then you look, all of that came from the middles who didn't have any errors and put up these crazy numbers. Harper Murray's killing a third of her balls. Taylor Landfair killed about a third of her balls. And you'd like to get that closer to 50% like Wisconsin.

Can anyone stop Taylor Landfair and Nebraska? | Amarillo Mullen

But, you know, I have to keep telling myself that's not who Nebraska is. Like Wisconsin's pin hitters carry them. Texas's pin hitters carry them. Kentucky certainly does. Nebraska just does it a different way. They don't have the country's most terminal outside hitters. But they do have the best middle blocker duo in the country. And Bergen Riley does such a great job running that offense, and Nebraska plays such great defense, you can kind of get by with it. 

Lincoln and I used to say on the show, until this year, when Nebraska set a school record for hitting percentage, that Nebraska is the Iowa football of volleyball. They will beat you with defense and special teams and third block and defense. And they don't always have a great offense. And this year they do.

So those are just a couple of things and you're just looking for things that can go wrong at this point. And I think Jalen Reyes has said this too; his job is to find areas where they can get better and Landfair and Murray started [against Kansas] with one kill in their first ten attempts combined and you're like, “man, Kansas could find their way out of first here; that could be trouble!” And then they just never did.

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Is it good Nebraska avoids Louisville?

Josh: Do you think DBK is happy, sneakily or maybe outspokenly, that they're not having to play Louisville? Just to not have to deal with that discussion? They’re gonna take care of business, I imagine [against Texas A&M], but that that is a story that they don't have to worry about going into this one.

Jeff: This was something I talked about on the show when the tournament came out; so a couple of weeks ago. I personally am glad that they're not going to have to play Louisville because there's just so much stuff that's wrapped up in that. Although Dani would obviously have a pretty good scout on Louisville. I don't know that it would have affected [the players] very much.

But [John] Cook has talked about before, when they played Wisconsin in the 2000 National Championship match, a team that he had like recruited all of those players; he wasn't even able to enjoy it. He didn't enjoy winning a national title and going undefeated because it came at the expense of players that he loved. And I'm sure it would have been an element of that for Dani Busboon Kelly as well.

One year ago, Dani Busboom Kelly was coaching Louisville in the national championship. Is she happy they won't play the Cardinals this December? | Sam Upshaw Jr./Courier Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Jeff: Yeah, I think Louisville may have been impacted more because they're seeing their former coach there, but Nebraska would have been all right.

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Watch the entire podcast below!

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