LINCOLN — Perhaps the turnover bug was contagious this weekend around Nebraska’s campus.

At the Coliseum Saturday night, the Huskers let a sweep slip right through their fingers. But at least Nebraska’s volleyball team never let victory escape its grasp.

In a match that could’ve been big trouble for NU, the fifth-ranked Huskers pulled out a 25-22, 25-22, 22-25, 25-15 win over a dangerous Oklahoma club. Hannah Werth hit .342 and had a career-best 19 kills, and Lindsey Licht turned in a season-high 16 kills while swinging at a .345 clip.

John Cook said he was plenty concerned about how his team would perform against the Sooners. For one, the coach still was worried about his team’s ability to move on from Wednesday’s disappointing five-set home loss against No. 14 Iowa State.

And yes, Cook said, it was difficult for anybody associated with the school not to feel stung by the Nebraska football team’s error-plagued loss earlier Saturday against the Cyclones.

“It’s amazing the impact that has on our team and all of us,” Cook said about the Huskers’ success and failure in football. “But even though we didn’t play our best volleyball tonight, we didn’t mentally take ourselves out of it. So I think that’s a really big step for this team.”

After winning sets one and two, Nebraska built a comfortable 20-15 lead in game three. But the scrappy Sooners battled back to steal the set. OU put together a 7-0 run with standout Suzy Boulavsky serving and the off-target Huskers slapping the ball everywhere except inside the court.

But immediately after that meltdown, Nebraska bounced back to dominate set four.

“There’s not much you can say or do in that short amount of time (between sets three and four) except clear your mind and come out strong that next game,” said Licht, who also had six blocks. “We just went out there with a huge amount of trust in each other and just took care of the little things.”

Most of the Huskers — Licht and Tara Mueller in particular — experienced their share of ups and downs Saturday. But Cook said he was proud of the way his team kept it together — something it didn’t do earlier in the week against Iowa State.

Mueller served up a career-high four aces and finished with nine kills and 12 digs. Brooke Delano’s seven blocks were the most for any Husker in two months, and Kori Cooper added 12 kills on .409 hitting. Kayla Banwarth also had 20 digs, bumping her career total to 979 and moving into 10th place on NU’s all-time list.

Unlike last month, when the Huskers needed five sets to pull out a hard-fought road victory at OU, Nebraska did enough to keep the Sooners from gaining too much momentum.

“Oklahoma is twice is good as when we played them down there,” said Cook, whose Huskers travel to Texas Tech on Wednesday. “This is a team that’s really scary to play, so I think this was an important win for us.”

Oklahoma (13-7, 6-5)................22 22 25 15

Nebraska (15-5, 8-3).................25 25 22 25

Oklahoma (kills-aces-blocks): Barker 3-1-3, Boulavsky 19-0-2, Laplante 5-0-1, Higgins 4-0-1, Ekwerekwu 5-0-3, Freudenrich 6-0-5, Fernanda 0-2-0, Alva 0-0-0, Reynolds 1-0-0, Disarro 1-0-1.

Nebraska (kills-aces-blocks): Anderson 4-0-1, Licht 16-0-6, Delano 3-1-7, Cooper 12-0-5, Mueller 9-4-3, Werth 19-0-1, Banwarth 0-2-0, Mancuso 0-0-0, James 0-0-0.

Set assists: Oklahoma 38 (Barker 33); Nebraska 60 (Anderson 51). A: 4,166.

Contact the writer:

444-1207, chad.purcell@owh.com