Nebraska Volleyball earns number five seed in 2019 tournament

It’s tournament time for Nebraska volleyball and the Huskers have earned the five seed in this year’s tourney.

After finishing the season at 25-4, Nebraska volleyball now turns its attention to the postseason, where they sit as the five seed. The good news is that they earned a high seed and will host the first and second round at the Bob Devaney Center this weekend.

The bad news, however, is that they landed in Wisconsin’s side of the bracket. The Badgers swept the Huskers in each of the two’s match-ups this year and didn’t seem to have many problem at all with Nebraska. Those two matches were easily Nebraska’s two worst of the season.

We’ll worry about that potential match-up when we get to it though. For now, the Huskers have to shift the focus to Ball State, who they host this weekend in the first round. If they win that one, they’ll face either Missouri or Northern Iowa in the second round for the right to get to the Sweet Sixteen.

https://twitter.com/NCAAVolleyball/status/1201314798597746688?s=20

Interestingly enough, Nebraska faced Missouri in round two last year and swept the Tigers. It’s a new year though, so that means nothing. Plus, let’s not count out UNI, as that’s a program that took down the Huskers just a few years ago in the regular season.

I know the Huskers will need to take it match-by-match, but it’s fun to look ahead anyway. If Nebraska wants to make it to a fifth straight Final Four this year, they’ll have to knock off a Wisconsin team that has been a royal thorn in their side this year.

This reminds me of last year, when the Huskers had the same struggles against Minnesota and had the opportunity to play them in the Elite Eight. Instead, the Gophers lost in Minneapolis to Oregon the round before and missed out on a chance to play in their home town in the Final Four and potentially the National Championship.

The point there is that anything can happen in the tournament. Wisconsin has struggled in the tournament in years past and they could certainly fall before meeting Nebraska this year. The same goes for the Cornhuskers, of course, who will have some tough potential match-ups and need to focus on those before shifting their attention to a potential game against the big bad Badgers.

First up is Ball State and if Nebraska can take care of business there, they’ll face either Northern Iowa or Missouri.

Go Big Red!