UCLA is set to enter its third season in the Big Ten, following a sophomore campaign in which the program captured three NCAA championships – the most of any Big Ten school. The conference as a whole earned 10 different national titles in the most recent cycle. Daily Bruin Sports has broken down the top programs of UCLA’s Big Ten rivals.
Football
2025 record: 7-6, 4-5 Big Ten, SRS Distribution Las Vegas Bowl appearance
Coach: Matt Rhule
Player to watch: Anthony Colandrea
A new chapter of Cornhusker football is being written in 2026 as the dust finally settles on coaching and personnel changes. Steady at the helm of the program is coach Matt Rhule, who is entering his fourth year in the position.
Now-Oregon quarterback Dylan Raiola finished with the second-best completion rate in the Big Ten – ahead of Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza – in 2025, based on the nine games he started in before he broke his fibula during the game against USC. Losing their under center who, at the time, boasted the fourth-best pass completion rate in the nation was a tough blow for the Cornhuskers who only managed one more win after opening the season 6-3 under Raiola.
Regardless, Raiola has since found greener grass on the West Coast and Nebraska will instead turn to UNLV transfer Anthony Colandrea to lead its attack. The 2025 Mountain West Offensive Player of the Year has racked up 7,542 yards in the air for 49 touchdowns across his career at UNLV and Virginia, in addition to 1,151 yards on the ground for 12 touchdowns.
Colandrea’s ability to both sling and scramble earned him a spot on the 2026 Maxwell Award Watch List. Should Colandrea’s talents transfer to the Big Ten stage – which should be familiar to him, considering he played at the Power Four level in Charlottesville and earned a win over now-conference foe UCLA in Las Vegas – the St. Petersburg, Florida, local has the makings of a quarterback for Lincoln record books.
Freshman Jamal Rule joins Colandrea as one of the most promising new additions to Nebraska’s offensive roster. While he currently sits third on the depth chart among running backs, he is just one of three freshmen to appear on it for any position and could be on the brink of a breakout season. Rule ranked No. 34 nationally among running back recruits, according to Rivals, and recorded 1,362 yards on 173 carries for 16 touchdowns as a senior in high school.
Nebraska named a new defensive coordinator ahead of its 2026 campaign, and after ranking among the bottom four teams in the Big Ten in sacks and forced fumbles last season, newly appointed Rob Aurich has work to do if his team wants to redefine its defensive identity. Aurich arrived in Lincoln from San Diego State, where he led the Aztecs to the sixth-best defense in the nation in points allowed per game during his first season as defensive coordinator in 2025.
Revamping the defensive line is a top priority for the Cornhuskers if Aurich wants to replicate the success he saw in his previous position. Stopping opposing teams’ run games – especially against a slate of conference opponents known to rely on rushing – was a weak point for Nebraska last season, and new personnel will transition into tackling this challenge in 2026.
UCLA transfer Anthony Jones Jr. – who has cycled through five teams in as many years – topped the depth chart for one of the starting defensive end positions and tackles Pitt transfer Jahsear Whittington alongside Boston College transplant Owen Stoudmire will likely hold down the interior. With Aurich likely transitioning the defense from a 3-3-5 scheme to a 4-2-5 formation, a bolstered defensive line will impact how linebacker and secondary positions take shape. If its efforts to stop the run game prove effective, though, Nebraska could be looking at a much more efficient defense, which is at the crux of the team’s success.
The Cornhuskers’ schedule is front-loaded with competition that should give them an easy ride through the opening quarter of the season. Big Ten play will likely prove to be a bigger challenge, though, and apart from its conference opener against Michigan State and a latter-season game versus Rutgers – which lost to over 29 point underdogs UMass in its first game of 2026 – Nebraska will have to work hard to earn a winning conference record.
Women’s volleyball
2025 record: 33-1, 20-0 Big Ten, NCAA regional final loss
Coach: Dani Busboom Kelly
Players to watch: Andi Jackson, Harper Murray, Bergen Reilly
While Nebraska football may stake claim on Memorial Stadium as its home venue, it is the school’s women’s volleyball team that has brought the most fans to the storied gridiron.
A record-breaking 92,003 people packed the stadium – which featured additional seats on the turf – to watch the top-ranked Cornhuskers beat Omaha on Volleyball Day in Nebraska in 2023. The game was not only the most attended at Memorial Stadium, it was also the most attended women’s sporting event in the nation’s history, at any level of competition.
For the third time in the past five years, Nebraska entered the season ranked No. 1. The preseason nod marked the 124th week the Cornhuskers have spent atop the AVCA Coaches Poll all-time, and the second-consecutive campaign coach Dani Busboom Kelly has earned her team the top spot in as many years in the role.
Busboom Kelly took over the position in 2025 from John Cook, who in his 25 seasons at Nebraska led the team to four national championships. Despite their last title coming in 2017, the Cornhuskers have put together some of their strongest iterations in recent years, and the 2026 squad makes a strong argument for yet another national championship run.
At the heart of the roster is a trio of All-American seniors. Middle blocker Andi Jackson, outside hitter Harper Murray and setter Bergen Reilly all return for a fourth year with Nebraska after earning First Team All-American honors in 2025.
Last season, Jackson led the nation with a .467 hitting percentage, Murray averaged a career-best 3.54 kills and Reilly recorded double-doubles in all six of the team’s matches over three sets.
While the NCAA’s new eligibility rules giving Jackson, Murray and Reilly the option to return for a fifth year alleviates some of the pressure – and promise – of gunning for a national title knowing it is your last season, the seniors likely still play with the understanding that their opportunities to vie for a ring are slimming.
In 2025, after becoming the third team in program history to earn a spotless regular season record and earning the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA tournament, Nebraska fell to soon-to-be national champions Texas A&M in the regional final. Its 33-win run – an impressive feat especially given the sheer number of games – was all of a sudden halted abruptly, and a single loss overshadowed an onslaught of victories.
The Cornhuskers return most of their talent from last year’s run. The biggest hole they have been tasked with filling is the one left by All-American middle blocker Rebekah Allick, who averaged 2.56 kills and 1.27 blocks per set in her final collegiate season in 2025.
Luckily for Nebraska, it saw zero players depart for the transfer portal for the second consecutive offseason, a rarity in this era of college sports that leaves the team with plenty of young talent boasting experience in Lincoln to develop in the open role.
Coming so close to glory likely left the lingering taste of what could have been. Couple that feeling with the veteran experience at the core of their roster and the Cornhuskers have a lethal substance. All the makings of a title run are there – Nebraska is on the cusp of its first national championship in nine years after spending the past decade as consistently the best team in the nation.
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