The NCAA Women’s Volleyball Championship has just two contenders left, the Nebraska Huskers, and the Texas Longhorns. While many speculated the Wisconsin Badgers would face Nebraska in the finals, Texas made sure to overpower Wisconsin to clinch the spot in the regional finals.

The Texas Longhorns displayed their fierce armor-shattering offense to crumble the defense-heavy team of Wisconsin. Although many would assume that Texas can beat Nebraska the same way, a Nebraska Huskers asset doesn’t think so. In fact, he dropped the reasons citing why every team failed against the 5x NCAA Champions.

The 3x All-American hurdle no opponent can surpass

The radio voice of the Nebraska Huskers Volleyball, John Baylor, recently appeared in an interview. Huskers Radio Network tweeted the video on X where he mentioned why Nebraska’s defense is impenetrable. When Jessica Coody asked Baylor about the moment that worked in Huskers’ favor, stating, “Whenever somebody’s needed, they rise to the occasion.” On this, Baylor named one player in particular who spells doom for Nebraska’s opponents.

Baylor mentioned, “The one you don’t notice is Lexi Rodriguez because opponents design their entire game plan around avoiding her. But she led the team in digs yesterday. She’s going to be huge against Texas.” Lexi Rodriguez is one of the captains of the Nebraska Huskers and plays the libero and defensive specialist position.

True to Baylor’s words, it is impossible to avoid Lexi Rodriguez as she always sneaks her arms under the volleyball for those digs. The 3x All-American secured 14 digs against Pittsburgh in the semis, and her season high of 20 blocks came against Arkansas in the quarterfinals.

The University of Nebraska junior has already scored 430 digs this year and was named the 2023 Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year. While Rodriguez is the X-Factor of the defense of Nebraska, that’s not everything they have. In fact, the Nebraska Huskers have solid blocking and kill-scoring capacity as well.

The limitless arsenal of the Nebraska Huskers

John Baylor gave a breakdown of the strengths of the Nebraska Huskers using their match against Pittsburgh as a reference. He said, “Bekka Allick, 10 blocks, kaboom, just blocking them. She was huge. And huge kills by Harper who had a big night offensively.” 

The Nebraska Huskers scored 15 blocks against Pittsburgh, and Baylor believes that if they can get some early blocks against Texas, they can control the game. Baylor continued, “Harper’s always taken big swings. Merritt’s led the way. Those middles with big blocks. And if they’re involved offensively, you know, good things are happening.”

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The Texas Longhorns defeated Wisconsin, which was the only team to best the Huskers in 2023. But, Baylor believes that Wisconsin was highly predictable against Texas, which led to their downfall. Unlike the Badgers, however, the radio analyst said that the Nebraska Huskers are highly unpredictable. Will the Nebraska Huskers be able to defy Texas in the finals and take their sixth title win?

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