Undertow

Add another piece of hardware to Gary Pepin's trophy room - if there is any room left. 2019 Indoor Midwest Region Men's COY. By my calculation, he is closer to 75 than 70, and examining the bio of the other coaches, I don't see a natural successor. Even though he looks great physically, he probably retires in a couple of years. That's a lot of excellence going out the door when he finally exits and a huge void to fill.

Thanks for the info. And thanks for updating my previous post.

Of course, the 2019 Men's Big Ten Indoor Track & Field Championship is followed up by Pepin being named Conference Coach of the Year for Indoor T&F. That makes 28 Conference Coach of the Year awards he's accumulated in the Big 8, Big 12, and now B1G. And that's not counting region and national COY honors. Someone will have to tell me how to post this twitter stuff so that it shows up in the reply instead of as a link. I don't participate in social media so I don't have a twitter account proper.

That is my understanding also. D-1 schools are allowed 6 scholarships for beach volleyball,, but the catch is that if they play at all in the indoor season then that scholarship counts against the indoor team which is allowed a total of 12 full scholarships. So a team like Nebraska doesn't hand out any beach volleyball scholarships and the girls getting an indoor volleyball scholarship can play both sports. Conversely, if a girl from USC or UCLA gets a beach volleyball scholarship (full or partial), they can't play on the indoor team. It helps out budget wise. The last time I saw any data on it, the budget for beach volleyball at Nebraska was only about 150K, with almost all of it traveling expenses. But it does put Nebraska at a disadvantage when playing other D-1 schools on the beach.

They added about 5 more matches to the schedule than last year to bring the total to the mid-twenties. But this doesn't appear to signal' any commitment to take the program full time. Most of the schedule adds are division 2, division 3, and even some NAIA schools. By comparison, UCLA won the beach title last year and played 44 matches, predominately against other D-1 competition with only a couple of exceptions. Here is the article from Husker.com http://www.huskers.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=100&ATCLID=211792590 Stivrins is the best beach player, in fact, Ty Hildebrand (ex Husker assistant and current director of USA beach volleyball coaching) commented last fall that he thought she had a future in the professional side of beach volleyball. Not surprised that Stivrins and Hames are team 1. What is somewhat surprising is team 2. An incoming freshman and seldom played setter. Also, Lexi Sun is not on any team pairing which is a little odd. Foecke and Maloney are not on the roster and haven't been since it was first published. I'm making the assumption that was to provide room for Knuckles and Kubik who are incoming scholarship players. Brooke Smith was on the roster, but has been removed in the last week or so. Kubik is an interesting case. She did an interview following a high school all-star match and stated that she chose Nebraska so she could develop into a six rotational player to help her go pro. No equivocating about what she was going to do after university; she's going to the professional leagues.

The season is already underway with the Husker's sporting a 7-2 record after two weekends. Tristen Edwards and Alyvia Simmons are back and they were the top 2 hitters by average on the team last year. Edwards also led the team in home runs and slugging percentage and was 1st team All-B1G. Of course Kaylan Jablonski is gone, and she was 2nd on the team in home runs and slugging percentage. Additionally, she was by far the best pitcher on the staff. Simmons and Jablonski were 2nd team All-B1G. Edwards has started out well this season and has B1G player of the week and National player of the week recognition already under her belt. Of the newcomers, Wallace and Walljasper appear to be the headliners. Walljasper (pitcher) was named California POY small school division, and Wallace (pitcher/infielder) was named Nebraska Gatorade's POY. Walljasper has started out hot at the plate AND on the mound and has a B1G freshman of the week award already. From a pitching perspective, losing Jablonski was a noticeable hit. She was 21-14 winning about two-thirds of the teams 31 victories. She also had 6 saves. The 2nd best pitcher on the staff was Olivia Ferrel who was 9-8 with an ERA over 4, as a freshman. The big disappointment from the pitching side was the lack of production from Regan Mergele. She was the huge get of the 2017 recruiting cycle coming from Butler County Juco having won a national championship her sophomore year and having compiled a 53-3 record with a 1.15 ERA in her two years there. In her junior year at Nebraska, she was nearly invisible with a 1-1 record and a nearly 5 ERA in 6 starts. I don't know if it was an injury problem or if the stage is "too big," but I expected a better transition after being so dominant at the Juco level. This year, Walljasper and Wallace have already been inserted into the rotation with mixed but mostly positive results. Walljasper is 2-0 with an ERA under 2. Wallace is also 2-0 but got abused in a no decision and currently has an ERA over 5. Ferrel got absolutely lit on an outing against Texas Tech (0 outs, 7 earned runs), but followed that up with a decent outing last weekend against Pitt. The good news is that after taking a loss in relief in the first weekend, Mergele came back with a complete game shutout of NC State with 9 strikeouts and only 3 walks. She (Mergele) currently has an ERA hovering around 1 after 18 innings pitched with 27 strikeouts against only 9 walks. Right now it appears to be pitching by committee with a young staff that includes 2 freshman and a sophomore. It will be interesting on how much of a load Mergele takes if she continues to pitch well. I couldn't find a pre-season poll for the B1G, but initially it appeared that Michigan & Minnesota were the class of the league, followed by Northwestern and Ohio State, with Wisconsin and Nebraska competing for NCAA tournament berths. However, after two weekends, Illinois and Indiana have also inserted themselves as contenders in the conference. Last year, the team started out pretty well in non-conference by beating a few teams ranked in the top 25. Of course they did get drilled by the big dogs (Washington and Oklahoma) but that was to be expected. They started out the B1G season by keeping their heads above water in the first half of conference play (8-5), but then they lost 8 straight before winning the final regular season game. They followed up a 9-13 conference season with a first round loss in the conference tournament. And this resulted in being shut out of the NCAA tournament for the 2nd straight year. Revelle is a HOF coach. She has guided the team to the NCAA's in 20 of 26 years. However, two of the six years her teams haven't made it.....have been the last two. Coach Sippel is the pitching coach and has averaged an All Conference performer per year at that position. She has actually been at Nebraska longer than Coach Revelle. The question might be are they losing their edge as age creeps up on them. Or are the past two years the exception. On most days, this team will score on the plus side of 4 runs. The big unknown is the pitching. It is probably too much too ask Walljasper and Wallace to come in and carry the group. Ferrel needs to continue to improve and lower her ERA down in the low 3s. Mergele needs to "obtain, retain, and sustain" the form that made her an imposing Juco pitcher. Otherwise, it looks like they're missing the NCAAs for a third straight year.

Although this thread has meandered across multiple topics, I wanted to weigh in on the Scott Frost hiring. Attached is an article (and shortened video) from a long time sports anchor in the Orlando area. Note that this wasn't made public until the Monday AFTER Frost made his decision to go to Nebraska. There may be some slight embellishment to enhance the story (see the end when he talks about the autographed footballs) but the meat of the story rings true. The fact that two media people could and would keep the conversation with Frost under wraps until after the decision, probably speaks to the fact that they are from a different generation than the 'look at me first' types that litter the current landscape, and to obvious respect they had for Frost and the way he went about his business. This story rings legit to me. It was a difficult decision. And, as the article states, Florida never had a chance. Or Tennessee. Or any other school not named UCF or Nebraska. https://www.wesh.com/article/pats-2-cents-scott-frosts-dilemma/14029273

The analogy comparing Kansas football to Nebraska basketball holds up until you start discussing facilities. Kansas is behind the arms race when it comes to football, and, much like Purdue did a couple of years ago, the school has finally invested tens of million dollars to upgrade the football facilities to at least make it competitive with other Big 12 schools (otherwise you don't get Les Miles as a coach). Nebraska, on the other hand, has 'top 10 in the nation' basketball facilities. Miles has had sufficient time to prove himself-----and now it is time to move on. I don't follow the mid majors much, but Nate Oates from Buffalo might deserve a longer look. In his 3 previous seasons at Buffalo, the Bulls have made the NCAA tournament twice and have a tournament victory (that's right, the Buffalo Bulls have more tournament wins than the Huskers). He was a successful High School coach in the Detroit area, before Bobby Hurley hired him as an assistant to Buffalo. He took over when Hurley left for ASU. This season he is 17-1 and currently ranked 14th (they are losing to Northern Illinois tonight). Marshall is having a down year at WSU and may be able to be pried from Wichita. But he makes 3.5 million and is good through 2022. It would take 4 million at least and, as someone else pointed out, that wasn't enough to get him to Alabama. Of course that was coming off a 37-1 season. As a contrast Oats makes 600K a year. However, I would not pinch pennies on this hire.

Foecke may be harder to replace than realized. As I said on another post, she was easily the best player on the court in the NCAA finals which included a total of 9 All-Americans and the 'consensus' POY. Throughout her career, Foecke has come up huge in the big moments. Stivrins can take up some of that slack, but Sun needs to be more consistent in primetime. Great against Illinois in the semi's, not so much against Stanford in the finals. But you're correct that there will be solid core with Sun, Stivrins, and Hames. Stivrins and Hames appear to be the new leadership on this team, I would be surprised if they are not co-captains next fall. I am curious how Husker Power will impact Sun, Schwarzenbach, Hames and the newcomer Madi Kubik. Kubik is a 6'2" outside hitter who should be on campus in January. She wants to be a six rotational player and her goal is to go pro after college. Stivrins is a workout warrior and I doubt she will let anyone slide in the weight room. Sweet remains a curiosity to me. She had glimpses in pre-conference play of having a breakout year, but when they ran into the meat of conference play, it was as if she lost her confidence. Her play in her sophomore year wasn't noticeably better than her freshman year. If she doesn't improve appreciably this year, she may be finding more time on the bench. Stanford returns most of their team (including the POY Plummer) with the exception of their All-American Libero. They will likely be the top ranked team pre-season. Minnesota and Illinois both lose their All-American 'generational' setters and Nebraska fan can relate to how difficult that transition can be regardless of how highly touted the replacement is. Penn State also loses a senior setter and an All-Conference outside hitter, but, like Nebraska, returns a solid core of young players who gained a lot of experience last year. I guessing, with the John Cook effect thrown in, Nebraska will be the B1G pre-season favorite and probably ranked 2 nationally to start 2019.

Thanks for posting. Always good to see the latest accolades she is receiving. I'm not on social media so there is no way I would have found this on my own. It is appreciated. When she was playing for club Dinamo Kazan, they won two European Club championships and one World Club championship. Since she moved to play for a club in Turkey (Ezacibasi VitrA) they have won two European Club championships and two World Club championships. The 'Govnah' never tires of winning apparently. She is still playing in Turkey (I think). I believe Kelly Hunter and Kelsey Robinson are also playing in Turkey. She wants to play in the 2020 Olympics on the indoor national team. So retirement is still a couple of years away.

It is hard to tell when they actually vote or determine who the 4 finalists will be. It appears that they make the selection prior to the tournament. When you look at the previous year, it lists Simone Lee and Haleigh Washington from Penn State (no. 1 seed), Plummer from Stanford (no. 2 seed), and Rhamat Alhassan (middle blocker, SEC player of the year) from Florida (no. 3 seed). Kelly Hunter didn't make the list. It appears that if you're not on the top seeded teams in the tourney (and I mean 1 through 4), then they don't seriously consider you. To get their credibility back, they need to make the selections AFTER the tournament. The AVCA should do the same. Another point on Foecke. For all the hype that Plummer gets (and as a 6' 6" outside hitter, she gets a lot of attention), Foecke was clearly the best player in the championship match. And for those who say it was just one match, go and look at their season stats. The only stat that Plummer has over Foecke is kills per set. Unfortunately, that's the sexy stat the everyone fawns over. But in every other stat line, Foecke was better. Foecke had more service aces, less service errors, a better hitting percentage (by about 40 points), more digs per set, more blocks per set (THAT surprised me), and even more assists if you wanted to drill down that far.

That was one headline I didn't want to see last spring. I was hoping he would stay for 2 to 3 years at least. I didn't know if he (Hildebrand) burned any bridges leaving after only one year, but the fact he was back for the Ameritas Challenge indicates that everything is copacetic. John Baylor did an interview with him (during the Wake match I think) and while nothing groundbreaking was said, it was a friendly encounter. Ty did indicate that Lauren Stivrins would make a helluva beach volleyball player. I'm a thousand miles away from the program, but everything I've heard about the guy has been positive. Lauren Cook and Baylor are effusive in their praise of him (not so much the new guy). Hildebrand was largely responsible for getting Annika Albrecht to that next level as the 2nd outside hitter. Once everything clicked for Albrecht during the UCLA series last year, the entire team took a jump up in performance (still not sure how they lost to Northern Iowa). I don't how much he makes in his current position in USA beach volleyball (supervisor of coaches and players?). And I don't know if a seven figure salary would be enough to bring him back to the midwest long term. But from all appearances, he would be a good get.

Agreed that Cook will have a multitude of former assistants to select from and it wouldn't surprise me if the Nebraska Volleyball Head Job isn't approaching a million a year in the not to distant future making it more desirable and competitive. And while she may be a great leader, who knows if Larson can coach a lick. She already has made an impact on the 2021 recruiting class by her appearance and speech at an Nebraska all star volleyball camp this past summer. Both Rylee Gray and Ally Batenhorst mentioned the event (and Larson's talk specifically) as having an influence on their eventual decision to commit to the Huskers. Larson probably has a higher volleyball Q factor than most on Cook's coaching tree, particularly for young teen girls playing high level club volleyball.

Back in 1997, you have to remember that ESPN was building up the Big Ten Conference, making it seem that it was the best conference in the country. In reality it wasn't, and it wasn't even close. For all those that say that Michigan played a tougher schedule, that is also wrong. See the link below describing why the AP got it wrong in 1997. Just a caution. It goes into all 25 team rankings in 1997 so the article is somewhat long, but it clearly delineates why Nebraska should have been voted No. 1. http://tiptop25.com/fixing1997.html The author is not a Husker Fan, he just objectively lays out why Nebraska should have been voted number 1. I'm curious if anybody who reads the article can come back and argue logically that Michigan had claim to the title (aside from the fact it wasn't decided on the field).

Thanks for posting. She is one Nebraska's All Timers. The last I knew, she was one of a handful of million dollar pro players. I don't know how much longer she'll play on the Team USA and professionally, but the fact that she is Captain on Team USA leads me to wonder if coaching is in her future. Cook is 62 and probably has several years left coaching the Huskers, but how cool would it be if, when she retired from playing, she came on board as an assistant with the possibility of taking over when Cook retires.