university of nebraska cornhuskers mens basketball

Known primarily at this point as a Volleyball school (football hasn’t been a National contender in a quarter century), Nebraska did well in Men’s Basketball in the first year of the expanded Big Ten Conference, continuing a drastic upward swing for the program.

Having gone 10-22 in 2022, the Huskers rallied for a .500 season the following year, and then won an impressive 23 games in 2024, nabbing a spot in the NCAA Tournament.

There was hope for a second run to the Big Dance in 2025, and they began the season 6-1 before a harsh dose of reality hit in East Lansing as Michigan State throttled them by 37.

Nebraska rebounded well though, putting together a six game winning streak heading into January. Just as quickly, things went awry, as they proceeded to drop six straight.

Then, just when it seemed the season couldn’t get any stranger…it did.

Nebraska upset #18 Illinois at home then, using that momentum, rolled into Eugene and defeated the #16 Ducks, who were dealing with their own strange lull at the time. They continued to win three of their next four, with the lone loss being a narrow defeat to #25 Maryland.

At this point the Huskers seemed on the fast track back to the tournament, but then they randomly finished the regular season with five consecutive losses, dashing not only their NCAA Tournament hopes, but their Big Ten Tournament hopes as well.

The cherry on top of this bizarre sundae that was their 2025 season was that they were invited to compete in the inaugural College Basketball Crown, a postseason tournament held in Las Vegas.

They won all four of their games and were the CBC Champions.

After all of that, what they do in 2026 seems to be anyone’s guess.

Nebraska loses its two most productive offensive players in Brice Williams and Juwan Gary, who averaged 20 and 15 points per game respectively, while each shooting over 45 percent from the field.

They return Connor Essegian and bring in two 4-Star recruits in Colin Rice and Leo Curtis, along with Tulsa transfer Jared Garcia and Utah transfer Ezra Ausar.