'She's too good': Nebraska's Olivia Mauch was headed for a redshirt

There was a time when coach John Cook thought Olivia Mauch may use a redshirt season during her first year with the Nebraska volleyball team. But all it took was a few weeks of spring practice for Cook to see that probably wasn’t happening, and now the freshman defensive specialist from Bennington is playing well in the areas of serve-receive and serving for the No. 2 team in the country.

Mauch and the Huskers are down to the last four matches of the Big Ten season, starting with Wednesday’s match at Iowa. While the Huskers were already really good with the “littles” on the roster — led by Lexi Rodriguez and Laney Choboy — Mauch has been able to help that group be elite. Mauch graduated from high school early and joined the Huskers in January for the beach volleyball season and spring practice.

With Choboy on the roster, maybe a redshirt would be best for Mauch. “But she’s too good,” Cook said. It was during the spring when Mauch got the feeling that she could play at this level.

And hearing Cook say that she was too good to redshirt boosted Mauch’s confidence even more. Entering college, Mauch was the No. 16 ranked recruit in the country and second-best defensive specialist.

But when you’re a freshman you never really know how much you’re going to be able to play, and that’s magnified on a team like Nebraska that returned so many players from a Big Ten championship team. “I’m really excited that I’ve been able to get on the court this much,” Mauch said. When Nebraska is in serve-receive, opponents sometimes try to serve away from Rodriguez because she’s so good at it.

That means teams challenge other players such as Harper Murray and Mauch. But sometimes Mauch isn’t a great option to serve at either. Mauch has conceded just five aces over 263 attempts.

Mauch thinks repetition and practicing passing so much in high school and club volleyball is how she got good at it. “In club, I would take up most of the court in passing, so I think it was the coaches giving me confidence to be able to do that has helped me a lot,” Mauch said. Nebraska’s other main players in serve-receive are Murray (427 attempts), Rodriguez (346 attempts) and Choboy (237 attempts).

During a four-set win against Minnesota last week, Mauch passed the most serves with 19 and didn’t concede an ace. Mauch ranks as one of the top-10 players in the country for serve-receive, with Chad Gordon’s analytics posted on X grading factors such as the quality of the server faced, aces allowed and the percentage of good passes to the setter. Analytics for serve-receive has gone public more this year than in past seasons.

Mauch noticed when she got included in a post on social media. “I was like, ‘That’s crazy that they keep track of all of these things,’” Mauch said. “In high school, I’d always look at my numbers, but nobody ever really paid attention to serve-receive so I think it’s really cool in college how they pay so much attention to that.

” Mauch has also had some success serving. At times Cook has had Mauch enter the match and serve early in the set, which could mean more attempts for her over the course of a long match. During a recent win at Oregon Mauch served a 6-0 run in the third set that helped finish off the Ducks.

She had two aces that match. In Nebraska’s stunning sweep at Wisconsin on Nov. 1 Mauch had 20 serving attempts, including two aces.

She’s had 267 serving attempts — most coming since the Big Ten season began — and dropped in 10 aces. “Sometimes I’m nervous, depending on the score,” Mauch said of serving. “Other times I just take a deep breath, and I feel like that I’ve served so many times so it’s just putting the ball in the court and making it move and letting us play defense behind it.

” Other servers who have helped Nebraska rack up points include Rodriguez (397 attempts), Bergen Reilly (367) Merritt Beason (347), Murray (309) and Kennedi Orr (254). Murray leads the Huskers with 26 ace serves. Mauch also has 146 digs.

While playing soccer growing up Mauch played defender, so she’s always been defensive-minded. Outside of volleyball practice, she did some virtual reality training to help with her focus, reaction time, decision making and hand-eye coordination. Now during the season, watching video of matches has helped her to see what she could do differently to be in the right place to dig a shot.

Cook feels like Mauch has quickly become an asset for the Huskers. “She’s already putting up huge numbers passing, and we’re running a ton of points with her serving,” he said. Reach the writer at 402-473-7435 or bwagner@journalstar.

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