Before coming to the United States, Virginia Adriano hadn’t heard of Wrigley Field or AT&T Stadium. 

The Turin, Italy, native admitted that she’s not much of a fan of baseball or football (the American kind). 

What she does know is how big a deal the Huskers are after playing a volleyball match in front of a record crowd of 92,003 three years ago and capturing international headlines. 

“With anybody I talk to, and I’m like, I’m gonna play in a baseball field, and it’s gonna be crazy. And people are like, Oh my God, what are you guys doing? Who are you? Why are you doing all that?” Adriano said. “It’s definitely really cool that we get to experience this. We’re blessed and very, very lucky to have this experience of these games.”

Now, the sophomore opposite will get to experience the celebrity that comes with playing for the Huskers when Nebraska kicks off its season with matches at the home of the Dallas Cowboys, Vegas Golden Knights, Chicago Sky and Chicago Cubs during the first two weeks. 

The 2026 season starts with a series of “once-in-a-lifetime” events. But for Nebraska volleyball, those experiences are becoming almost an annual occurrence. The Huskers are a traveling road show, selling out arenas from coast to coast. 

“It’s cool that they keep finding these random venues for us to play in,” senior Harper Murray said. “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.”

On top of their quest to win another Big Ten title and the program’s first national championship since 2017, the Huskers are the main attraction. Indiana sold out its match with NU in July. Same for NU’s trip to South Dakota State. Maryland moved its match to the much larger Xfinity Center hoping to replicate the school record attendance of 13,071 set two years ago. 

When the Huskers eventually return home, they will play in front of an expanded John Cook Arena that can hold 10,000 fans. NU will also play Creighton in the 15,500-seat Pinnacle Bank Arena. 

This is not a new trend for the Huskers. Last year, NU set attendance records in eight arenas. They handled the pressure of big crowds at home and on the road while getting everyone’s best shot. 

Senior setter Bergen Reilly has enjoyed watching the sport grow since her freshman year. From coast to coast, fans line up to watch the Huskers, wait for them by their bus for autographs and pay top dollar on secondary markets to get tickets. Despite the pressure and attention, she says it is worth it to elevate the game and women’s sports. 

“We want to put on a show for everyone,” Reilly said. “It might be someone’s first time at a Nebraska game. We might be tired; it might have been a long game the night before, but it could be their first time, so let’s go out and give them a show.”

The seniors are used to the traveling road show. During the first week of their first season, they played in front of a sold-out Memorial Stadium and set a record for a women’s sporting event in the United States. 

They hope that experience will help them prepare for this round of matches in big venues — if they could remember more about Volleyball Day in Nebraska. Murray said she doesn’t have many distinct memories about the match. She only recalls sitting on the court and watching the post-match fireworks. 

“I blacked out. I don’t remember it whatsoever,” Murray said. “They’re going to be excited, and I’m sure that they might have similar feelings. They might not really take it in in the moment, but later on they’re going to realize how crazy it actually was and how exciting and a little bit nerve-wracking it was.”

To prepare for the big matches, they aren’t talking about it a lot as a team. Jackson said they don’t want to scare their teammates, overhype the event or put too much pressure on it. It’s not because they don’t care — they just don’t want to overhype the event and make people more nervous. It’s a cool experience, but they want to enjoy it when it comes up. 

AT&T Stadium could threaten the attendance record set at Volleyball Day in Nebraska, but it will be under a closed roof and will use a best-of-three format. The matches in Vegas will be more about renewing the rivalry with Texas since the Huskers have played in NHL arenas in Tampa and Nashville during the past several years. 

The Wrigley Field match will present different challenges since it is outdoors. Still, the Huskers have experience with playing in the elements from their beach season (although they use a heavier ball than the one used indoors) as well as the Memorial Stadium match.  

“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,” Jackson said. “These big venues — they’re intimidating, but I think they’re also so exciting. So shifting our mindset from being intimidated to being excited. 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.”

NU coach Dani Busboom Kelly said when building the schedule, she considers several factors, including playing in the home areas of the Huskers, challenging opponents and the opportunities presented to the program (like bringing in revenue, NIL funds and exposure). 

With the Devaney Center remodel pushing into the season, it worked out well for the Huskers to spend more time on the road this season. Busboom Kelly said she’s excited to bring back the Texas rivalry and the opportunities they have during the start of the season. 

“It’s pretty heavy, maybe heavier than I would have liked, traveling the first two weeks,” she said. “At the end of the day, it’s going to be good for us and get us out of our comfort zone. It’ll be a lot of different experiences that we’ll be able to look back on later on in the season.”

Despite all the excitement around the early-season matches, growing the game and breaking new ground for women’s sports isn’t the main purpose of the season. 

For the seniors, they don’t have to be told of the one gaping hole in their resumes at Nebraska. The four-member class has gone 99-6 in their first three seasons. They have eight All-American awards and have won three Big Ten championships. 

Now, all they have to do is finish the season with a win. 

Nebraska was the favorite to win a national championship last season. It did not complete that goal. And the Huskers do not need to be reminded of that fact. 

“They’re pretty motivated, but I also think they’ve felt disappointment for three years in a row, so I don’t think the right method to go about that is just hammering home winning or leaving a legacy,” Busboom Kelly said. 

Reilly said they’ve focused on finishing strong all offseason, through workouts, practices and summer camps. 

“We all know how the last three years have ended, and we need to prove that we can do it. We can get it finished,” Reilly said. “That’s been the theme of everything, starting from beach. How are we gonna finish when things get hard? Whether it’s a lift, a practice, a game, how are we going to finish? When we were working our youth camps, we were there for two weeks. It’s getting really long, but are we gonna finish strong? It’s in everything we do. We need to finish because at the end of the day, it’s not how we start the season; it’s how we finish.”

They begin the season with the No. 1 ranking, return starters and plenty of motivation after their season was ended in the regional finals by Texas A&M.

During the offseason, a former NU All-American has worked with the team to help shape their mindset. They can’t go into the season with a championship-or-bust mentality. Busboom Kelly said that approach will likely leave them feeling terrible, win or lose. Instead, they are focusing on feeling great about what they accomplished at Nebraska.

“We want to be really confident in no matter how the season ends, knowing that we left it all out there, and we really want to leave the season with no regrets,” Jackson said. “We just want to know that we didn’t miss the mark on anything. We were intentional with everything that we did, whether that was in school, in lift, on the court, in practice; we just want to know that we did everything that was in our control and whatever happens out of our control is out of our control.”

The Huskers have plenty to build on from last season. NU hit a school record .351 last season and held opponents to an NCAA-low .129 hitting percentage. The team’s core returns, with Reilly running the show at setter, Murray at outside hitter and Jackson at middle blocker. Adriano will also be back at opposite in her second year in the program. 

Libero will likely remain a timeshare between senior Laney Choboy and junior Olivia Mauch. Sophomore Teraya Sigler and junior Skyler Pierce will battle for time at outside hitter. Sophomores Manaia Ogbechie and Kenna Cogill will compete for the starting spot. 

Beyond those players, NU has plenty of depth and other players who could earn time on the court. If Busboom Kelly’s first year showed anything, it is that everyone will see the court to build depth and give players a fresh start for the season. 

The Huskers were the unanimous pick by the league coaches to win the conference championship for the fourth straight year. The league appears to be better than it was a year ago when NU clinched the title with more than a week left in the regular season. 

“Going into this season, we know what it takes, and we’re not gonna back down,” Jackson said. “We know that we have a target on our back, and a lot of people want to beat Nebraska. We’ve won the last three. So we are not going to get complacent. We know that it’s not going to come easy, but it’s definitely our goal to go 4-for-4.”

The road to the championship will feature an additional challenge this season with the introduction of the Big Ten Tournament in November. The new event will raise the stakes in the final week of the season and prepare them for the postseason against top teams in the conference. 

“That’s a different type of pressure that we’re going to feel much earlier than we have in the past,” Busboom Kelly said. 

While everything they do is aimed at peaking in December, the Huskers are not singularly focused on winning a title. They want to enjoy the ride. Take in the special opportunities to play in venues that have never hosted a volleyball match. 

Reilly said she didn’t want the end goal to take away from the daily joy of playing volleyball at Nebraska, including the special opportunities and venues to start the season.

“Our goal in December is to win a national championship, but my mindset has changed on that, and just taking it day by day,” she said. “We have a lot of games to win before that, and a lot of days to come in and practice as hard as we came before that. So, (I’m) not necessarily just thinking about December the whole season. Obviously, it’s always in the back of our mind, but I do think that my mindset has changed a little bit. How can I learn some lessons from each and every day, each and every game, to then be able to translate that over to December?”