Creighton outside hitter Ava Martin soared through the sky, cocked back her right arm and hammered the volleyball off the outstretched hands of two Nebraska players.
Once the ball fell to the floor, the blue portion of a historic crowd, outnumbered by the Big Red in the arena, punched above its weight with a roar that rang through a sold-out CHI Health Center.
Jays fans went berserk. CU coach Brian Rosen smiled as he jumped out of his chair and into a huddle with his staff. And Martin — prolific all night — raced back to Creighton’s huddle, where middle blocker Eloise Brandewie leaned in and let loose in celebration.
CU had just forced a fifth set against the top-ranked team in the country. At long last, the Jays had sole possession of momentum that swung tirelessly.
But Tuesday ended in another Bluejay heartbreak.
The feeling was all too familiar. For the third time in four years, Creighton dropped a five-setter to the No. 1 Huskers, who won 25-17, 21-25, 25-18, 24-26, 15-9 with an NCAA record 17,675 fans in the stands.
“Fifth sets are anyone’s game,” Martin said. “It comes down to the little things. Obviously, we battled, but things just didn’t go our way.”
Battled they did.
Creighton (5-5) dropped the first set before capitalizing on Nebraska’s 15 errors in the second. What could’ve been a deflating third turned into fuel for the Jays, who outlasted the Huskers (9-0) down the stretch of the fourth. Martin delivered a fifth.
Before Tuesday, only top-10 Kentucky had taken NU the distance. Tuesday was only the fourth five-setter in the spotty history between the Jays and Huskers.
Encouraging as that may be, a different night produced the same result for the CU, now 0-24 against its in-state rival.
“Proud of the fight,” said Rosen, in his first season as the Jays’ head coach. “Proud of the way we showed Creighton volleyball on a national stage, and continued to prove to each other that we belong here, that we’re just as good as anyone.”
Martin — 16 kills on 50 swings — carried CU to the fifth. The final blow she landed had Creighton up 4-3 in the deciding set, and then Nebraska flipped the script.
Consecutive kills from Husker star Harper Murray, to put NU ahead for the first time in the fifth, forced Rosen to burn a timeout. CU players calmed each other down as the red-clad contingent at CHI went wild, drowning out a thunderous “Let’s Go Jays!” with an even louder “Go Big Reddddd!”
That was at the height of a game-changing 6-2 run from the Huskers, fueled late by Murray, middle blocker Rebekah Allick and opposite hitter Virginia Adriano.
Creighton never climbed out of a hole Nebraska dug one rally at a time.
“I think it was 3-3, then all of a sudden it was 6-3 on some balls that we’d love to have back,” Rosen said. “But I didn’t think it was ever a lack of effort or going after it.”
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