With preseason preparations complete, No. 1 Nebraska volleyball is about to embark on a nationwide tour of an early nonconference schedule, featuring six or seven matches in four different cities and four different professional venues.
The Huskers will participate in two different first-of-its-kind events with NIL-based monetary prizes on the line — one in an NFL stadium and the other in an NHL arena — before playing a road match at a Summit League school then continuing on to Chicago, where they’ll play in a WNBA arena and an MLB park.
“I think it’ll be a great challenge for us right off the bat,” Bergen Reilly said. “Obviously, we have a lot of tough games, but also just traveling and dealing with the adversity of that and time zones, and we’re playing in some crazy arenas, so it’s big events too. So kind of managing our emotions with that will be really good for us. You never know, in December you could be traveling for three weeks straight too, so kind of preparing us for that a little bit. But I’m really excited. I think it’s going to be a really great way to start off our season.”
It all starts on Thursday when the Huskers travel to Arlington, Texas, to compete in the inaugural Spikes Under the Lights exhibition tournament at AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys. Nebraska will face No. 17 Florida in the first best-of-three semifinal, with No. 10 Penn State and No. 11 SMU playing in the other. The winners will then compete in the championship with a $1 million prize purse on the line.
“We get asked a lot to do events, and as the sport of volleyball grows and more people are wanting to showcase the sport, there are a lot of options,” Coach Dani Busboom Kelly said. “But when Dallas came about, I thought that was so unique because it’s exhibition. There’s money on the line, technically, but it is going to be more of an introduction to the season. There’s not pressure, wins or losses don’t count for anything, so we’ll be able to play a lot of people, and it’ll be a great experience.”
The Gators went 16-12 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 Stuck 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.
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 won’t be the first time Nebraska’s seniors have played inside a football stadium. They’ll be able to lean on their experience from the world record-setting Volleyball Day in Nebraska at Memorial Stadium as they prepare their underclassmen for what they’ll face in Arlington, where the stadium can hold more than 80,000 people.
“We know that we’re playing at AT&T, and it’s going to be huge, and there’s going to be a lot of tickets sold, and so none of these venues feel real right now, and I don’t think they will until we get there and we’re in the present,” Andi Jackson said. “But I do think the fact that we have played in the stadium and we have some knowledge on it, and then the fact that we played beach too, I think that helps us a little bit because we’ve played outside before. And so for the stadium game, for example, we knew how to manage the wind. Obviously, it’s not ideal, but we knew what to do …
“These big venues, they’re intimidating, but I think they’re also so exciting, and so shifting our mindset from being intimidated to being excited, and we’re growing women’s sports, so we have nothing to lose. We’re excited, and at the end of the day, it’s about women’s sports. It’s not about us.”
The Huskers and Gators will face off to start the event at 7 p.m. CT, with SMU-Penn State to follow and the championship after that, all on TNT.
Two days later, the Huskers will open their official season at the Players Era Showcase in Las Vegas. Nebraska will play two matches at T-Mobile Arena, the home of the NHL’s Las Vegas Golden Knights that can seat 18,000 people. They’ll take on UNLV on Saturday at 7 p.m. on FS1 and No. 2 Texas on Sunday at 2:30 p.m. on FOX, the first meeting between the two former conference rivals since the 2023 National Championship.
“Piggybacking [Arlington] right into Vegas and kind of renewing the rivalry with Texas is really exciting for me,” Busboom Kelly said. “I grew up in the Big 12 and played here in the Big 12, and so that Texas rivalry runs pretty deep. I thought it was a great call by both myself and Jerritt [Elliott] to renew that and showcase the sport even more. They have everybody returning, we have most everybody returning, so it should be a really fun match.”
Before renewing the rivalry, the Cornhuskers will have to take care of business against the Rebels, who went 13-15 in 2025 but returned their top point-scorer in outside hitter Jaida Harris (3.52 kills per set on .218 hitting and 38 aces) plus their top two middle blockers, their libero and their primary setter. UNLV also has a Nebraska native on its roster in sophomore outside hitter Tia Traudt, a Grand Island product who played in 22 sets as a freshman.
The Longhorns went 26-4 in 2025, falling to Wisconsin in the Regional Finals. They entered the season ranked second behind Nebraska in the AVCA Coaches Poll after returning six players who started 15 or more matches last year, including their top two attackers in Torrey Stafford (4.69 kills per set on .360 hitting) and Cari Spears (3.25 on .295).
However, the Longhorns opened this season at the AVCA First Serve and dropped their first match to No. 12 Arizona State in four sets. They also needed five sets to get past Marquette on Monday. Texas ran a 6-2 in the First Serve with junior Rella Binney and freshman Genevieve Harris setting while senior Ella Swindle, last year’s starter who set the Longhorns to a national title as a freshman in 2023, did not see the court in either match. The Longhorns also recorded 41 service errors across the two matches.
Despite their first-week struggles, Texas still has a loaded roster and will get a week to work on the issues that popped up in the First Serve before facing the Huskers. The Longhorns will first play TCU in Vegas on Saturday, with the Horned Frogs and Rebels to square off on Sunday as well.
“They’re such a good program, and they have a good team every single year,” Jackson said of Texas. “They’re very consistent. Obviously, the last time we played them didn’t go our way, and that’s OK, that’s sports. But I think just opening the season with such a strong team and a game against such a strong team is going to be super exciting, not only for us but for the fans as well. People want to see great matchups, they want to see good volleyball, and so getting to do that, especially at such a big venue, I think it’s super exciting, and I’m very excited to see what happens.”
The Huskers won’t get much time back in Lincoln before hitting the road again as they will visit South Dakota State on Wednesday, Sept. 2, to open week two. The Jackrabbits won 50 matches and made two NCAA Tournament appearances across the 2024 and 2025 seasons. First Bank & Trust Arena in Brookings can hold 5,000 people.
The Huskers will then spend the weekend in Chicago, where they’ll face DePaul at Wintrust Arena (capacity of 10,387 and home of the WNBA’s Chicago Sky along with the Blue Demons) on Sept. 4.
On Sept. 6, they’ll head outdoors to face Missouri in the Big Ten/SEC Challenge at the Chicago Cubs’ Wrigley Field, which can hold more than 40,000 fans.
“I think it’s really fun, and I think it’s really cool, just because, I think coming into our freshman year four years ago, you wouldn’t think that we’re going to go play in the Dallas Cowboys’ stadium or in Wrigley Field or even in our stadium for that matter,” Harper Murray said. “So I think it’s cool how much it’s grown over the last few years and how they’re finding new venues to let us play in … I think it’ll be really fun, and I think it’s cool that they keep finding these random venues for us to play in because again, it shows that they need a place for all of our fans to be there, and for all of them to be able to come and fill the space with them.”
The Wrigley match caps a stretch of six or seven matches in 11 days, all away from home as renovations wrap up at the Devaney Center. Busboom Kelly said the schedule ended up a little heavier early on than she would have liked, but the Huskers already had some of the matches on the books and she felt she couldn’t turn down some of the opportunities that arose later on. Aside from securing wins, she views the tour as a chance for further team boding and preparation for the postseason.
“It’s some shared experiences, and it’s going to be hard,” Busboom Kelly said. “It’s going to be hard on our bodies, whether these games are sweeps or they go five sets. But traveling and getting on planes, and of course, a lot of these are events, so we’re going to have a lot more things to do besides just showing up for the game. I think that’ll be something we can look back on when you think about the NCAA Tournament and even the Big 10 Tournament, what’s going to come along with those things on top of just playing?
“We’re going to already have had a lot of experience with this group. It’s not the pressure of the NCAA Tournament, but there’s going to be pressure when it comes to eyes on us, TVs, cameras in our faces. So that’s a different type of pressure that we’re going to get to feel much earlier than we have in the past, and especially with some players that are going to have new roles and some new starters that are going to be feeling that for the first time.”
Following the nationwide tour, the Huskers will spend the rest of their nonconference slate at home. Nebraska will welcome fans into the new-look John Cook Arena starting in week three with the Husker Invitational, featuring matches against New Mexico on Sept. 10, No. 21 Baylor on Sept. 11 and Georgia Tech on Sept. 12. They’ll venture down the road to face No. 13 Creighton at Pinnacle Bank Arena on Sept. 16 then return to the Devaney Center to close out the nonconference with the Ameritas Players Challenge, including matches against No. 21 North Carolina on Sept. 18 and Florida Gulf Coast on Sept. 20.
The Huskers want to put on a show in 2026, and they’ll have the opportunity to do just that at some of the biggest venues in the country before debuting their own newly renovated arena during a packed nonconference slate that should set them up well heading into the always competitive Big Ten.
“It’ll be busy, but it’ll be really fun,” sophomore Keri Leimbach said. “I just have to think about how much of an amazing opportunity it is. Our team, you get to travel with your best friends and play on the biggest stages. It’s honestly just so cool, and I’m really excited.”
