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ANR
I heard through the grapevine something this weekend that really got stuck in my gears.
Wednesday promises to be a historic and memorable day for many with Volleyball Day in Nebraska, a pair of volleyball matches in front of an expected women’s athletics record-breaking crowd inside Memorial Stadium.
The Huskers will play UNO while Wayne State challenges UNK in an exhibition (the official start of the Division II season isn’t until later in the week).
Anyway, the remark in question went something like this. There isn’t really a reason to arrive in Lincoln too early, the ‘B’ game isn’t that important. The ‘B’ game obviously refers to WSC vs UNK.
No. I won’t sit quietly with this obvious slander towards anything less than Big Red volleyball. Wayne State and UNK are anything but ‘B’ teams.
WSC was a 30-3 team last season, spending five weeks at the No. 1 spot. Scott Kneifl, coach of the ‘Cats since 2005, has won more than 400 matches.
The Wildcats have won no less than 19 games since 2004. Kneifl has a 75 percent winning percentage at Wayne State, all doing so with a high majority of its roster being Nebraska girls.
The 2023 version of Wayne State features 13 players from the state of Nebraska -- almost 80 percent of its roster.
The Wildcats have made 12 NCAA Division II Tournament appearances since Kneifl took over the program, including a semifinal appearance in 2015.
At UNK, the volleyball program has two national runner-up finishes and has won more than 80 percent of its games over the course of the team’s history.
The Lopers have qualified for 23 straight NCAA tournaments and finished as national runner-up in 2005 and 2019. They also have a legendary coach by the name of Rick Squiers, who has been wearing blue since 1999. UNK finished the 2022 season at 28-6 and were ranked 15th in the final AVCA Division II coaches poll.
UNK features a similar roster balance with 13 Nebraska-born girls -- a 60 percent ratio given a slightly larger roster size. Wayne State is ranked No. 4 in the AVCA/TARAFLEX Div. II preseason poll while UNK sits at No. 16.
I spent a lot of time inside Kneifl’s office at Rice Auditorium back in the day covering Wildcat volleyball for the Wayne State student media.
He’s got a great volleyball mind and has probably forgotten more about the sport than I’ll ever know. He was always respectful and welcoming to me, a student reporter, treating me like any other professional media outlet. I never lost sight of that.
Wayne is a great community of around 5,000 people and the Wildcats have the opportunity to play in front of an estimated 91,000. The Husker game will be broadcast on BTN while the WSC-UNK game will be shown on Nebraska Public Media for those who aren’t headed to Lincoln.
Memorial Stadium will again be filled to the brim with red, but this guy will be there wearing black and gold. No hard feelings, Herbie. Willie the Wildcat is my guy today.
Please don’t overlook these girls who won’t be wearing red for Volleyball Day in Nebraska. Wayne State and UNK can ball, too.
RICHARD RHODEN can be reached at sports@hamilton.net.
