Michael Voepel, ESPN.com
The NCAA women’s volleyball final four will feature all four No. 1 seeds, as Nebraska and Penn State won their respective regional finals on Sunday, joining Pitt and Louisville, which advanced on Saturday.
The national semifinals will be held Thursday in Louisville. The Cardinals will face the hometown Panthers at 6:30 p.m. ET, followed by the Huskers vs. the Nittany Lions. Both games will be broadcast on ESPN. The national championship game will be played on Sunday, December 22 at 3 p.m. ET on ABC.
Both semifinals will feature conference opponents. ACC rivals Louisville and Pitt are vying for their first national volleyball championship. It’s a completely different story on the other side of the bracket: Big Ten rivals Penn State (7) and Nebraska (5) have 12 NCAA titles and nine second-place finishes between them.
During the regular season, No. 1 seed Pitt defeated Louisville in its two matchups, and Penn State defeated Nebraska in the meet.
The Huskers, currently in their 18th NCAA final four, advanced easily on Sunday, beating Wisconsin 26-24, 25-17, 25-21. Taylor Landfair, a senior playing her first season at Nebraska after transferring from Minnesota, led the Huskers with 11 kills. Nebraska also beat the Badgers in both Big Ten meetings this year.
Penn State is making its 14th appearance in the NCAA Final Four, but it had a harder time on Sunday. The Nittany Lions were pushed to five sets by No. 2 seed Creighton, who was trying to make the top four and secure an all-school semifinal in Nebraska. However, the Nittany Lions, having a home court advantage in regional play like the other No. 1 seeds, won the fifth set 15-7. Jess Mruzick led Penn State with 20 kills.
No head coach has ever won the NCAA Division I volleyball championship, which was first played in 1981. There is a chance it will happen this year, however, as two women – Louisville’s Dani Busboom Kelly and Penn State’s Katie Schumacher-Cawley – are in the final four.
The only coach in the final four to have previously won a title is Nebraska’s John Cook, who has four Huskers titles to his name. All of Penn State’s championships belonged to Russ Rose, who retired after the 2021 season.
