The Nebraska Cornhuskers (often abbreviated to Huskers) are the intercollegiate athletic teams that represent the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. The university is a member of the Big Ten Conference and competes in NCAA Division I, fielding twenty-four varsity teams (ten men's, fourteen women's) in sixteen sports. Twenty-one of these teams participate in the Big Ten, while beach volleyball, bowling, and rifle compete as independents or affiliate members of other conferences. The Cornhuskers are commonly referred to as the "Big Red" and have two official mascots, Herbie Husker and Lil' Red.
Nebraska was a founding member of the short-lived Western Interstate University Football Association, one of college football's first conferences, in 1892, and helped form the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association fifteen years later. The MVIAA, which became the Big Eight in 1964, served as Nebraska's primary conference for the next eighty-nine years, with a brief hiatus during World War I. In 1996, the Big Eight merged with four Texas schools from the Southwest Conference to form the Big 12. Nebraska joined the Big Ten in 2011, a lucrative transition that separated the school from most of its traditional rivals.
Nebraska's varsity athletic programs have won thirty-two national championships (eleven in bowling, eight in men's gymnastics, five each in football and volleyball, and three in women's track and field) and 359 combined conference regular-season and tournament championships.
Nickname The University of Nebraska did not have a nickname or mascot during its early decades, though many were used unofficially. NU's first football team wore gold and black and became known as the "Old Gold Knights," but it is unclear if the term was used contemporarily. In 1892, The Hesperian Student (later The Daily Nebraskan) urged the adoption of new colors due to the number of universities – specifically WIUFA rivals Iowa and Missouri – already using gold or yellow, and selected scarlet and cream as they were considered "bright and attractive." Throughout the 1890s the team may have gone by "Antelopes" and "Rattlesnake Boys," but the most well-known of Nebraska's early nicknames is "Bugeaters," a reference to the state's meager food supply during an 1870s drought when farmers purportedly ate bugs to survive. Many Nebraskans appreciated the rugged characterization despite its negative connotations.
The first documented use of "Cornhuskers" appeared in the March 17, 1894 issue of The Sporting News, in reference to a Western League baseball team from Sioux City that later became the Chicago White Sox. Six months later, the term appeared in The Hesperian Student ("We have met the corn huskers and they are ours!") as a derisive reference to Iowa. Nebraska State Journal (later the Lincoln Journal Star) sportswriter and state native Cy Sherman hated the Bugeaters moniker and began using "Cornhuskers" to refer to Nebraska in 1899. It caught on quickly and was adopted by the university in 1900, and later by the state of Nebraska itself, which became "The Cornhusker State" in 1946. Sherman is known as "the father of the Cornhuskers" and later founded college football's AP poll.
Varsity sports Baseball Basketball Basketball Beach volleyball Cross country Bowling Football Cross country Golf Flag football (2028) Gymnastics Golf Tennis Gymnastics Track and field Soccer Wrestling Softball Swimming and diving Tennis Track and field Volleyball Co-ed sports Rifle
Baseball
Nebraska established a baseball program in 1889, making it the school's oldest active varsity sport. The team was disjointed in its first decades, often disbanding for years at a time. The hiring of Tony Sharpe in 1947 brought stability but limited success – Sharpe and his successor John Sanders combined to lead fifty-one seasons, making just three postseason appearances. Dave Van Horn was hired in 1998 and established a national power, culminating in Nebraska's first College World Series appearances in 2001 and 2002, a landmark moment for a state that has hosted the event since 1950. Assistant Mike Anderson took over for Van Horn and led NU to its best-ever season, finishing 57–15 and reaching another College World Series in 2005. Anderson did not sustain this success and was fired in 2011, the same year Nebraska transitioned to the Big Ten. NU has experienced little national success since joining the conference.
Nebraska has been to eighteen NCAA Division I tournaments and three College World Series. Sixteen players have been named first-team All-Americans and Alex Gordon won the 2005 Golden Spikes Award as the country's best amateur player. Nebraska plays its home games at Hawks Field at Haymarket Park, built in 2001 to replace the aging Buck Beltzer Stadium.
Conference championships (8): 1929, 1948, 1950, 2001, 2003, 2005, 2017, 2021 Conference tournament championships (6): 1999, 2000, 2001, 2005, 2024, 2025 College World Series appearances (3): 2001, 2002, 2005
Basketball Men
Prior to the creation of the NCAA tournament, Nebraska was a Midwest power under head coaches Raymond G. Clapp and Ewald O. Stiehm. NU struggled through the post-World War II years, which included a stretch of twenty-eight years with just two winning seasons that stretched into the 1960s. Much of the team's modest modern-day success came during the fourteen-year tenure of Danny Nee, Nebraska's winningest head coach. Nee led the Cornhuskers to five of their nine NCAA Division I tournament appearances and won the 1996 National Invitation Tournament, NU's first national postseason title. In 2019, NU hired former Chicago Bulls head coach Fred Hoiberg, who led the Cornhuskers to the program's first NCAA tournament victories in 2026.
Nebraska's men's and women's basketball teams have played at West Haymarket Arena (known as Pinnacle Bank Arena for sponsorship purposes) since its construction in 2013.
Conference championships (6): 1912, 1913, 1914, 1916, 1949, 1950 Conference tournament championships (1): 1994
Women
Nebraska's women's basketball history began with a short-lived club team in the early 1900; the program was shuttered until the 1972 enactment of Title IX. Angela Beck took Nebraska to its first NCAA Division I tournament and won the 1988 Big Eight championship. Under Beck, Karen Jennings won the Wade Trophy as the country's best player in 1992–93.
Connie Yori, hired from Creighton in 2002, steadily built a national contender, culminating in a 2009–10 season that was the best in school history – NU started 30–0 and became the first Big 12 team to complete an undefeated regular season. Kelsey Griffin was a national player of the year finalist and Yori was named national coach of the year. Forward Jordan Hooper led Nebraska into the Big Ten and earned first-team All-America honors in 2013–14, the same season NU won its first conference tournament. Yori was forced to resign after an administrative investigation in 2016, and Nebraska turned to former player Amy Williams to lead the program.
Conference championships (2): 1988, 2010 Conference tournament championships (1): 2014
Bowling
Nebraska's bowling program was founded as a club team in 1983 and became a varsity sport in 1997. It is the most successful collegiate program in bowling history, winning eleven national championships and qualifying for every NCAA championship. Most of this success came under Bill Straub, who coached for thirty-six years and granted the first full scholarships in bowling history. The team has been coached by longtime assistant Paul Klempa since Straub's retirement in 2019.
Bowling competes in Conference USA, making it one of three programs at Nebraska not affiliated with the Big Ten.
WIBC (5) / NCAA (6) championships: 1991, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2001, 2004, 2005, 2009, 2013, 2015, 2021
Cross country Nebraska's men's cross country team was established in 1938, winning its only conference championship two years later. The women's program was established in 1975. Megan Elliott has coached both teams since 2024.
Men's conference championships (1): 1940 Women's conference championships (5): 1985, 1988, 1989, 1991, 1993
Flag football In 2026, Nebraska became the first power conference school to sponsor women's flag football, a limited-contact form of American football that is part of the NCAA Emerging Sports for Women program. It will be the school's twenty-seventh varsity sport when it begins competition in spring 2027.
NU hired Liz Sowers to serve as the program's head coach, with her twin sister Katie as an assistant; the pair led Ottawa University to five consecutive NAIA women's flag football national championship titles.
Football
Nebraska is among the most storied programs in college football history, winning forty-six conference championships and five national championships, along with seven unclaimed national titles. Its 1971 and 1995 teams are considered among the best ever. Heisman Trophy winners Johnny Rodgers, Mike Rozier, and Eric Crouch join twenty-four other Cornhuskers in the College Football Hall of Fame. Nebraska has played its home games at Memorial Stadium since 1923 and sold out every game at the venue since 1962.
The program's first extended period of success came early in the twentieth century. Between 1900 and 1916, Nebraska had five undefeated seasons and a stretch of thirty-four games without a loss. The Cornhuskers won twenty-four conference championships prior to World War II but struggled through the postwar years until Bob Devaney was hired in 1962. Devaney built Nebraska into a national power, winning two national championships and eight conference titles in eleven seasons as head coach. Offensive coordinator Tom Osborne was named Devaney's successor in 1973 and over the next twenty-five years established himself as one of the best coaches in college football history with his trademark I formation offense and revolutionary strength, conditioning, and nutrition programs. Following Osborne's retirement in 1997, Nebraska cycled through five head coaches before hiring Matt Rhule in 2023.
Conference championships (46): 1894, 1895, 1897, 1907, 1910, 1911, 1912, 1913, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, 1921, 1922, 1923, 1928, 1929, 1931, 1932, 1933, 1935, 1936, 1937, 1940, 1963, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1975, 1978, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1988, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1997, 1999 National championships (claimed in bold) (12): 1915, 1970, 1971, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1997
Golf
Nebraska's men's golf program was established in 1935 and has reached the NCAA Division I championship four times, most recently in 1999. Steve Friesen won the 1999 Ben Hogan Award as the country's best golfer under the guidance of longtime head coach Larry Romjue. The team has been coached by Judd Cornell since 2023.
A women's program was started 1975, initially led by Romjue. The Cornhuskers have played in fourteen NCAA regionals, advancing to the NCAA Division I championship three times. Kate Smith represented the program in the 2021 Arnold Palmer Cup. The university does not own or operate a golf course, and both teams use courses around Lincoln to practice and host tournaments.
Men's conference championships (2): 1936, 1937 Women's conference championships (2): 1976, 1983
Gymnastics Men
Since being established in 1939, Nebraska's men's gymnastics program has won eight national championships and forty-two NCAA event titles. The bulk of this success came under head coach Francis Allen, a former All-American who led the program for forty seasons. Twelve Cornhuskers have participated in the Olympic Games and combined to win four gold medals. The team has been coached by Chuck Chmelka since 2010.
NU is one of just twelve Division I universities that sponsors a men's gymnastics program.