In August of 2023, the Nebraska volleyball team played an exhibition match in a football stadium, setting a world record for attendance at a women’s sporting event. Four years later, the top-ranked Huskers will return to that setting to compete in the inaugural Spikes Under the Lights exhibition tournament.
Nebraska has joined No. 17 Florida, No. 10 Penn State and No. 11 SMU in the first-of-its-kind event at AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys. The four teams will compete in a tournament, with the Huskers and Gators opening the event at 7 p.m. CT while the Nittany Lions and Mustangs follow. The winners will then play in the championship match.
The matches will be best of three, with the first two sets to 21 and the third, if necessary, to 15. Each of the four teams receives $200,000, with an additional $150,000 to the champion and $50,000 to the runner-up. TNT will televise the event.
With the Huskers’ official season opener taking place two days later in Las Vegas, Spikes Under the Lights will provide Nebraska with a chance to test itself against high-level competition without the pressure of the results impacting their resume.
“You’re out there to win,” Coach Dani Busboom Kelly said during the Nebraska Volleyball Coach’s Show on the Huskers Radio Network Tuesday night. “I don’t think we’re going to play it differently, but it is kind of nice to know that this doesn’t count for your record or that NCAA seed. It doesn’t count for that, so you can maybe change up some things or try a couple things that you’ve seen in your practice gym that you want to see what they look like against an opponent.
“I think it’s interesting playing in a football stadium. We talk a lot about serving. We’ve been working really hard, I want our team to go after their serves, but is that really relevant in a football stadium? I don’t know.”
The Gators went 16-12 last season but still qualified for the NCAA Tournament in Ryan Theis’ first season at the helm. Florida lost two of its biggest stars with setter Alexis Stucky transferring to Penn State and middle blocker Jaela Auguste transferring to Wisconsin, but outside hitter Jordyn Byrd is back after leading the Gators with 3.97 kills per set on .206 hitting and earning second-team All-SEC honors as a sophomore. Libero Lily Hayes is back as well after averaging 3.62 digs per set to earn AVCA Southeast Region Freshman of the Year.
Nebraska owns a 9-4 lead in the all-time series between to two programs with the last meeting taking place in Lincoln in the 2018 opener, a 3-2 Gator win.
Spikes Under the Lights will be the first live competition of the season for the Huskers, Gators and Nittany Lions while the Mustangs opened their season in the AVCA First Serve, sweeping reigning national champion Texas A&M on Sunday.
Suli Davis is the name to know for SMU as the 6-foot-2 outside hitter transferred in following a standout freshman season at BYU. Davis led the Mustangs with 15 kills on .211 hitting while Ole Miss transfer Gabi Placide added nine kills on .389 hitting against the Aggies.
Penn State followed its 2024 national title with a 19-13 season, but Katie Schumacher-Cawley filled her program’s biggest need by reuniting Stucky with former Gator teammate Kennedy Martin, one of four unanimous preseason All-Big Ten selections (with the other three being Huskers). Former Husker Caroline Jurevicius is back for her redshirt junior season while another former Husker, Whitney Lauenstein, joined the team after playing in 23 matches across two seasons with Texas.
Thursday will be Nebraska fans’ first real look at the 2026 Huskers after Busboom Kelly decided to split up her starters during the Red-White Scrimmage. She indicated she has decided on her starters to open the season, though the margins between starter and backup are thinner than ever.
“Everybody loved our depth last year, but this year it’s closer,” Busboom Kelly said. “Last year it felt like there were pretty clear starters … but this year, the [backup] middles are Kenna [Cogill] and Keoni Williams, they’re so much improved. It’s crazy; they’re both doing awesome. Ryan Hunter now is a year older; she looks great. You have the Skyler Pierce; there are days she could absolutely be starter. So, I just think the margins are much smaller this year than they even were last year.”
Nebraska returns starters at setter (Bergen Reilly), outside hitter (Harper Murray), middle blocker (Andi Jackson) and opposite hitter (Virginia Adriano). It appears Teraya Sigler, who started at the other outside hitter spot but mostly played three rotations in the back row, and Manaia Ogbechie will fill the voids left by the departures of Taylor Landfair and Rebekah Allick, respectively.
After a strong spring, Sigler should get the opportunity to prove she can be a six-rotation player this season after the top-ranked recruit in the 2025 class began her career essentially as a defensive specialist. She’s not the blocker that the 6-foot-5 Landfair was, but Busboom Kelly praised her defense and all-around play.
“She needs to still gain the confidence attacking and from the service line, but what’s nice about her, even though she didn’t play front row in every match last year, she played in every match, so she has a lot of experience — back row, but still experience, and taking some big swings out of the back row in key moments,” Busboom Kelly said. “That’s going to translate nicely. I just want her to have more confidence against double blocks and triple blocks, which we’re going to see a lot this year.”
While Jackson is on a historic pace offensively and Ogbechie flashed both as an attacker and as a blocker as a freshman last season, Busboom Kelly said Cogill, coming off a redshirt, is statistically the team’s best blocker by far. She also called freshman Jayden Robinson the team’s best pin blocker — “just really talented in that skill” — while the other freshman outside hitter, Gabby DiVita, is among the team’s best passers already. Those individual strengths could get them on the court this season at some point or another.
“There could be some roles for them that might not be starters, but that we need them to come in and be great at what they’re great at,” Busboom Kelly said.
Perhaps the position where the margin is the thinnest is libero, where Busboom Kelly said it would “probably” be more of what we saw last year with Laney Choboy and Olivia Mauch both wearing the jersey at different points. Choboy started 22 matches at libero while Mauch got the nod 11 times in 2026.
“They’re both so talented, so important for our success, and we’re really lucky to have two great liberos,” said Busboom Kelly, who also praised the way Keri Leimbach is playing coming off her redshirt year.
Regardless of who starts on Thursday, Busboom Kelly said the exhibition nature of the matches could lead to her making substitutions she might otherwise avoid during the regular season. That being said, the head coach once again plans to use her bench all season long.
“Like last year, I hope to train our team to be great no matter who’s out there, and you can make changes and not miss a beat, and that’s the goal,” Busboom Kelly said. “I want to use the depth. It’s silly not to, so we want to use it and be comfortable using it.”
Anne Marie Anderson and Holly McPeak will call Thursday’s matches on TNT, while the Huskers Radio Network will broadcast the Nebraska match, or matches, with John Baylor and Lauren (Cook) West.
The volleyball court is getting prepared at AT&T Stadium in Dallas. ⁰⁰Jerry World hosts Spikes Under the Lights with Nebraska, SMU, Florida and Penn State on Thursday with a prize pool of $1 million. 😳 pic.twitter.com/heUCw1TRQi
— Hurrdat Sports (@HurrdatSports) August 26, 2026
