Prior to the AVCA First Serve, Nebraska volleyball senior Rebekah Allick’s last memories of playing in Pinnacle Bank Arena were not positive.
The Waverly alumna’s high school career ended in that arena in a five-set loss to Skutt Catholic in the 2021 state semifinals. On Sunday, she made a new memory, earning match MVP honors as No. 1 Nebraska swept No. 6 Stanford in front of a sold-out crowd, finishing 2-0 in the First Serve.
“That’s pretty cool, in a nutshell,” Allick said. “I think high school me would be pretty proud.”
Allick finished with 11 kills on .600 hitting and five blocks (two solo) as the Huskers crushed the Cardinal (1-1) 25-13, 25-19, 25-14. Allick said she’s experienced some great atmospheres in Pinnacle Bank Arena while watching her brother Josiah play for the men’s basketball team. On Sunday (and Friday as well), the siblings switched roles.
“It was really special,” Allick said. “I’ve been in the stands when my brother, when they beat Purdue and the court was rushed, and just the atmosphere in PBA, it’s a lot like Devaney, but it’s a little different, and I can’t quite pinpoint why. It was really cool just to be the receiving end of it.”
Andi Jackson earned match MVP in Nebraska’s win against No. 3 Pittsburgh, making it a weekend sweep for the Husker middles. The duo combined for 35 kills on .397 hitting and 24 blocks in the two matches.
“We’re a couple of dogs, man,” Allick said. “We’ve been saying this for years, the middles — me and Andi and Manaia [Ogbechie] and Kenna [Cogill] as well, and even the others we’ve had in the past — we’re constantly pushing ourselves. I think we speak for most middles on every team everywhere: we want to be set, but when you are set that ball, you have to deliver, and I think that’s exactly what Andi and I do. It feels good to be fed some more.”
The match featured two All-American outsides in Harper Murray and Stanford’s Elia Rubin as well as the match MVP in Allick, but it was Baylor transfer Allie Sczech, making her first Husker start at opposite hitter, who led everyone in kills with 12 on .400 hitting.
“I’ve been working a lot on my mindset right now,” Sczech said. “Obviously in the gym that we’re playing in, we’re competing every single day and our team is really competitive, which is really cool. It is definitely hard to get on the court, and so I think I just really tried to utilize my opportunity and kind of fall back on the things I’ve been working on off the court, especially mentally, when I went out there today.”
After giving freshman Virginia Adriano the start in the first match, Busboom Kelly said she turned to Sczech in the second because both earned the opportunity with their performance in practice.
“We’re going to use everybody on this roster when we need them, and so what a better atmosphere to play in than this?” Busboom Kelly said. “Also think there’s a part of me, you want to give your players these great opportunities. It’s Pinnacle Bank Arena, sold-out crowd, I wanted Allie to have that moment just like I wanted Virginia to have it. So it’s just cool to have the opportunity to play each of them in a match and get them experience, but also just soak in Nebraska volleyball.”
After an up-and-down performance against Pitt, Nebraska dominated Stanford from start to finish. The Huskers hit .385 as Bergen Reilly finished with 36 assists, nine digs, four kills and three blocks. Murray added 10 kills on .308 hitting and nine digs.
Libero Laney Choboy and right back Olivia Mauch notched 12 digs apiece as the Huskers out-dug the Cardinal 56 to 35 and held them to .094 hitting. Nebraska also earned a 9-2 edge in blocks.
The first set was all Nebraska as the Huskers out-hit the Cardinal .520 to .031, out-dug them 17 to eight and out-blocked them four to zero in the frame. One of the highlights of the game was a 4-0 serving run from Jackson including a kill and some strong defense for the middle in the back row.
Murray and Allick notched four kills apiece to lead the Huskers.
The second set belonged to Sczech. After taking just two swings in the first, she went off for seven kills on 10 errorless swings. The 6-foot-4 hitter said being dynamic was the key to her big set.
Allie Sczech spikes the ball against the Stanford Cardinals during the AVAC First Serve volleyball match on Sunday, Aug. 24, 2025 in Lincoln, Nebraska. Photo by John S. Peterson.
“I think at the end of the day, sometimes against these good teams, it’s just about mixing up your shots,” Sczech said. “I think you can’t be predictable, and I feel like that’s kind of what I did well in that second set.”
Taylor Landfair put together a personal 3-0 run with two kills and a block early to give the Huskers a bit of separation and they maintained control the rest of the way. The Huskers hit .438 and held Stanford to .209.
After misfiring just twice in each of the two sets, Nebraska recorded attack errors on the first two rallies of set three. However, they recovered quickly with a 4-0 run and led the rest of the way.
Nebraska used a 6-1 run featuring three kills from Allick midway through the set to extend the lead to nine at 17-8. Senior Maisie Boesiger made her season debut late in the set and served a 3-0 run including a dig on her first point, then she passed a serve that led to an Allick kill, which drew a big reaction from the bench.
“From what I know from her past four years, she’s been a great teammate, and then she’s really improved,” Busboom Kelly said of the walk-on out of Norris. “I think not only she earned it from being a great teammate, a great person standpoint, but she earned it with her play. It was great to see her come in ice cold, and she got them out of system three times in a row, and then going up against their best server, she nailed the pass … It’s just really special when you put players in and then they deliver and just builds confidence for this team.
“I think they also start to trust that I’m going to do what I say, I’m going to get players in and we’re going to trust our bench and utilize them throughout the year.”
In a fitting end, Sczech closed out the match with a kill on the final point. The Huskers hit .263 and held Stanford to .000.
The head coach said the 2-0 weekend against top-10 competition was a reflection of what she’s been seeing on the practice floor.
“We knew we were good,” Busboom Kelly said. “It’s just showing it and playing loose and playing free and showing what we do in practice in a match. It’s a lot tougher in a match, as everybody knows, but we kind of talked about that today wasn’t an anomaly; that is us. We’re not going to play that great every single night, but now we’ve kind of set the bar of what we’re capable of.”
Nebraska will look to bottle the PBA magic and take it on the road as the Huskers head to Nashville next week. They’ll visit Lipscomb on Friday before competing against No. 7 Kentucky in the Broadway Block Party on Sunday.
