 "Photo: Bryant Haertlein, Daily Texan Staff")
Nebraska head coach John Cook strolled into the room — somber, deadpan.
“Is this new?” Cook asked Texas’ sports information director.
While Texas has had the meeting room, which doubles as the site of press conferences, since last season, what confused Cook were the new decorations — the huge panoramic picture on the back wall was new. The picture, a mammoth reproduction of Gregory Gymnasium from the Longhorns’ win over Nebraska last season.
A year later, the picture was much the same.
Record crowd, check. On Wednesday, 4,324 people packed themselves into Gregory to best the old record set last season against Nebraska.
Huge performance by outside hitter Destinee Hooker, check. Hooker finished the match with 24 kills. Last season, she notched 17.
Texas beats Nebraska to even the Big 12 race, check. The Longhorns’ win Wednesday set up Texas’ chance at a second straight co-conference championship with the Huskers.
Though Cook doesn’t remember the meeting room, he did remember last year’s loss.
“We competed hard all night. We played better than we did last year,” Cook said. “We lost four All-Americans [from last season]. They have four All-Americans back. And we’re 4-and-4 in sets with them this year, with this team. That is pretty good.”
While Cook thinks his team played stronger this season than last in Austin, the result was the same. And the star for Texas, Hooker, shined even brighter on this night.
Any hopes of neutralizing the huge, orange-clad crowd early were thrown to the way side after Hooker started the game off with a blistering kill to put Texas ahead 1-0 in the first set. Hooker rose high from the back line and smashed a kill from above the net to send the crowd into a frenzy. Such was the motif in the first set.
For the quick Texas start in the first, that ultimately established the tone for the match, and the recipe was simple. Hooker early and Hooker often.
Texas coach Jerritt Elliott has coached Hooker for three years. It didn’t matter: Even after the game he still wore the same look of amazement.
He shook his head and laughed with Ashley Engle when Hooker was asked about her first set performance. He didn’t know what else to do.“No. I have seen nothing close to that,” Elliott said. “Twelve kills in a game to 25. Wow. Everything she touched was golden. She couldn’t do anything wrong.”
In the first set, Texas as a team could do no wrong. The Longhorns only committed a single attack error, while Nebraska committed eight. And while Texas would finish with 13 attack errors on the night, the Huskers continually struggled, committing 33 errors while only hitting .165.
Nebraska, which many times swung around the Texas block to try to nick lines and earn precision points, was just off the whole night. Lindsey Licht, who blasted Texas earlier in the year in Lincoln, hitting a blistering .500, struggled. The opposite hitter who suffered an elbow injury, and had been unable to hit in practice this week, hit -.133 on Wednesday. Kori Cooper, who was one of the brightest spots for Nebraska all night, hitting .375, crumpled to the court in the fourth set with a knee injury.
With Cooper gone, so were Nebraska’s chances of heading back to Lincoln with the win.
“I thought we had our chances in this game,” Cook said. “We just hit it away. You are not going to beat anyone with 33 errors.”
Cook downplayed the importance of Hooker’s huge first set.
“We talked all week about having a ‘next play mentality.’ We knew she [Hooker] was going to get some hits in. But we came out and we were doing what we wanted to, getting them out of their rhythm on serve,” Cook said. “They were having to set to the back line to Hooker, because we got them off their game and setting to the front line.”
The w’Huskers would have been better off by letting Texas set to their front line, and away from Hooker who began the game from the back.
Jordan Larson, who might be Hooker’s biggest competition for Big 12 Player of the Year was reluctant to call Hookers performance anything special.
“We knew they would do big things, knew they would hit it hard,” Larson said. “We just had to shake it off and move on. We can hit it hard too.”
On Wednesday, the ’Huskers didn’t hit it as hard as Hooker.
“There is no doubt she is a very special athlete,” Elliott said. “She plays very well at home.”
It’s not sure if Texas will replace the wall-sized photo of last season’s huge victory with this season’s version. But either way, the picture looks sweet to Texas.
“It is a huge win,” Elliott said. “A lot of coaches look up to their program. To win this game, it is huge.”
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