No. 2 Nebraska volleyball defeats UCLA for John Cook's 700th Husker win

With the second-seeded Huskers' 25-22, 25-10, 23-25, 25-22 victory over UCLA at the Devaney Center on Friday, Cook reached 700 wins at Nebraska. He is the third coach at a current Big Ten program to do so, doing so in 801 games. That represents an 87% winning percentage in 25 seasons at NU.

Nebraska has now won eight straight games and handed the Bruins their first loss in the expanded league.

The California native led Nebraska to an undefeated national championship in his first season at Nebraska in 2000, and three more NCAA titles followed. He has won 13 conference titles, including last year. There have been 11 trips to the Final Four.

Cook helped the sport in Nebraska reach new heights with the move to an 8,000-seat arena and contributed to the sport's national rise.

Many games are televised these days, and more places than Nebraska sell out crowds. The highlight off the field came last season when Nebraska set a world record with 92,003 fans for a game at Memorial Stadium.

Friday marked John Cook Day as the athletic department had already planned a celebration of Cook's 25 years as Husker coach.

Fans received a Cook bobblehead and there was a large bouncy castle in the hall that fans took photos with.

During breaks in the game, video tributes to Cook from several former Huskers played on the big screen: Nancy Metcalf, Amber Holmquist, Laura Pilakowski, Dani Busboom, Amanda Gates, Gina Mancuso, Kadie Rolfzen, Mikaela Foecke, Kenzie Maloney, Madi Kubik and Nicklin Hames .

During the third set, Garth Brooks' “Friends in Low Places” came over the speakers and turned into a sing-along – probably another tribute to Cowboy Cook.

Cook also coached at Wisconsin for seven seasons and totaled 861 wins in his career.

While Cook didn't buy into all the fanfare, he appreciates all the thought and resources the athletic department staff puts into the volleyball program.

“It’s fun and people love it,” he said. “They do a great job connecting people to our program. So hats off to them.”

“It’s a lot of fun,” Cook added. “And of course I need to have more fun.”

On Friday, Nebraska native outside hitter Taylor Landfair came on late in the first set for Lindsay Krause and finished with a season-high 13 kills on .414 hitting, including four kills in the deciding final set.

“We needed a left side to defend some balls out of system and (Landfair) took aggressive swings and did a really good job,” Cook said. “She got some big blocks that we needed. So we’ll see.”

Sophomore middle blocker Andi Jackson also had 13 kills for a .409 hitting percentage. She also had five blocks. Merritt Beason and Harper Murray each had nine kills.

Lexi Rodriguez had 20 digs.

Nebraska's 14 total hitting errors in the final two sets dropped the Huskers' batting average to .246. UCLA hit .153

Outside hitter Cheridyn Leverette had 17 kills for UCLA.

John Cook Day was having good times throughout until he took a sharp turn towards the end of the third set. Nebraska led 22-14 and was on the verge of a win. Then UCLA libero Kat Lutz stunned the crowd with a 10-0 serve run. When her run finally ended after she shot into the net, the Bruins led 24-22. After another kill, the Bruins won the set and stayed alive.

“It was a complete loss of concentration,” Cook said. “We stopped passing the ball, we stopped going to the middle. We couldn’t kill a ball.”

In the fourth set, UCLA fended off Nebraska's blockers and led 9-8. Nebraska stormed ahead with a 4-0 run that included a great serve from Kennedi Orr and a big block from setter Bergen Reilly. UCLA cut the deficit to 23-22. Beason didn't have great match hitting, but got a massive kill on a back row attack to give Nebraska a match point. Landfair's block was the final point.

The first set was back and forth throughout until Nebraska won 25-22. UCLA scored multiple runs, but Jackson was a run-stopper for the Huskers with his slide attack. She had four kills on eight attempts in the set.

Nebraska won the final two points on a kill from Jackson and a kill from Landfair. The final point came after a long, successful review of the challenge card by Nebraska (assistant to Nebraska assistant coach Jaylen Reyes).