Nebraska Volleyball Gets Their Fifth Sweep of the Year Vs. Long Beach State

Former coach, Tyler Hildebrand and former middle blocker Callie Schwarzenbach received big welcomes as Long Beach State came to Devany

Behind strong serving and good defense the Huskers were able to clinch their fifth sweep of the season. Nebraska had 2 aces in the match and held Long Beach State to a .078% hitting average.

Nebraska had yet another change in the line up this year, as Freshman Middle Blocker, Maggie Mendelson came in on the right side opposite Whiteny Lauenstein and Lindsay Krause moved over to the outside.

The first set started out a close as The Beach stayed neck and neck with the Huskers through 12-12, after that the Huskers cleaned up some errors and pulled away to take the lead and the set 25-16.

The second was much closer through the whole set, Nebraska looked to pull away at the 12 point mark again, but weren’t able to keep Long Beach State from clawing their way back in. The Huskers finished the set on a Madi Kubik kill, her 1,000th!

The third set was all Huskers. They jumped out to an early lead and never looked back.

Nebraska’s strong serving kept Long Beach State’s setter, Zayna Meyer from getting good passes and they were able to limit the hitting attack from The Beach.

For the second time this week Whitney Lauenstein led the Huskers in kills with 12. Before the third set she was averaging over 5 kills per set this week. She his a .381 for the match. Lauenstein is able to hit all around the block. She has such height on her jumps and is able to not give away her angle with her body.

Kaitlyn Hord and Lauenstein also led the Huskers in blocks with 4.0. Having the 6 foot 5 Mendelson and the 6 foot 4 Hord as a blocking team was a great match up for the Huskers against The Beach’s tough hitters Morgan Chacon and Natalie Glenn. The Huskers weren’t as solid on their blocks against Creighton on Wednesday and really cleaned up their blocking for this match.

I also liked the trick plays at the middle the Huskers were playing with Bekka Allick. In one play she was the decoy at a wide middle and Madi Kubik came in on the inside and hit a fierce kill. The very next play Anni Evans was able to set Allick in the wide middle for a quick kill as well. Having Mendelson as another threat, the Huskers were able to run several plays like this to throw off The Beach’s blockers.

My favorite moment of the match came after the game when the Nebraska players circled Tyler Hildebrand and then Callie Shwarzenbach in a hug.

The Huskers next match comes up against a tough Stanford Team at the Bob on Tuesday.