LINCOLN — After two years away, Tyler Hildebrand will receive significantly more to return to the Nebraska sideline in the 2020 season.
According to his contract which runs through Jan. 31, 2023, Hildebrand will receive $175,000 annually as Nebraska’s associate head coach. As an assistant in 2018, he was paid $100,000 before he left to serve as the director of coaching for the beach program for USA Volleyball.
“There’s going to be responsibility that comes with that for him and more expectations, but he needs to feel that he needs to have that responsibility and that pressure and expectation,” NU coach John Cook said in January. “I’m pretty fired up about (Hildebrand returning) and it makes me feel like I can really challenge him and maybe other ways and give him some responsibilities more and then beyond just a young assistant coach.”
Nebraska assistants Kayla Banwarth and Jaylen Reyes each made a base salary of $81,600 in 2019. Banwarth accepted the head coaching position at Mississippi in December.
The contract also specifies Hildebrand’s start date as Aug. 10 after he finishes his duties with the USA Volleyball’s beach teams at the Olympics.
Kelly Hunter will serve as assistant coach until then helping with the beach program, spring training and recruiting, but she will not work under a contract. The former Husker All-America setter will serve as a volunteer assistant during the season.
Looking for parking
Long walks through a gravel parking lot and sometimes longer waits to exit the parking lot north of the Devaney Center will no longer be an issue for Nebraska volleyball fans.
The more pressing issue for the 2020 season is where they will be parking at all.
On Friday, the Nebraska Board of Regents approved a massive $16.5 million track and field facility slated for Innovation Campus. In the original designs, the footprint for the stadium was 8,300 square feet, but it grew — along with the price tag by $5 million — to 15,187 square feet encompassing all of Lot 58 and a public parking area between the Ice Box and Antelope Creek.
With construction slated to start in March, the area will be unavailable for volleyball parking for the upcoming season. In a statement on Thursday, an athletic department spokesman said parking will be developed on a vacant lot on Nebraska Innovation Campus.
“Athletics is working with Nebraska Innovation Campus on short- and long-term parking solutions east of the Devaney Center,” the statement said.
According to the Lincoln Journal Star, UNL Chancellor Ronnie Green said those plans could eventually include a parking garage.
Volleyball fans use four other lots around the Devaney Center for donor parking in addition to a large general public parking lot near the former State Fair Park horse racing track.
Abramovich heads to Cal Poly
The destination for one more of Nebraska’s four transfers is set.
Chen Abramovich said after spending a few months in her native Israel that she will enroll at Cal Poly in March. The Mustangs went 21-9 in 2019 and lost to Stanford in the second round of the NCAA tournament.
The 5-foot-6 defensive specialist played in one match in 2018 and did not appear in a match this season as she missed most of the year with an injury.
Junior outside hitter Capri Davis announced in December that she will attend Texas, while redshirt junior outside hitter Anezka Szabo enrolled at Kansas. Junior defensive specialist Megan Miller entered the transfer portal in January but has not announced her plans as she remains in classes at Nebraska.
The all-decade Nebraska volleyball team
The all-decade Nebraska volleyball team
First Team: Mikaela Foecke, outside hitter, 2015-18
First Team: Kelsey Robinson, outside hitter, 2013
First Team: Kadie Rolfzen, opposite hitter, 2013-16
First Team: Amber Rolfzen, middle blocker, 2013-16
First Team: Lauren Stivrins, middle blocker, 2017-present
First Team: Kelly Hunter, setter, 2013-17
First Team: Justine Wong-Orantes, libero, 2013-16
Second Team: Gina Mancuso, outside hitter, 2009-2012
Second Team: Hannah Werth, outside hitter, 2009-12
Second Team: Annika Albrecht, outside hitter, 2014-17
Second Team: Brooke Delano, middle blocker, 2008-2011
Second Team: Brianna Holman, middle blocker, 2015-2017