LINCOLN — Coastal Carolina’s 2008 volleyball season ended in the championship match of the Big South Conference tournament. Needing just one more win to make the postseason, the Chanticleers suffered a stinging four-set defeat against Liberty.

A week later, coach Kristen Bauer and her players learned that Liberty would open the NCAA tournament playing Nebraska at the Coliseum.

The news, Bauer said, made last year’s 27-win team feel like it had lost to Liberty all over again.

“That was really, really disappointing for us,” said Bauer, now in her 11th season leading the Chanticleers. “One, that we didn’t win. And two, that they were able to go to Nebraska and play on a great court, in a great setting, in front of the best volleyball fans in the country.”

A year later, Coastal Carolina will get to experience the Coliseum for itself. And if Nebraska fans know anything about schools from the Big South, it should be this: They haven’t looked afraid playing on college volleyball’s big stage.

During two of the past three postseasons, Big South champions have been shipped to Lincoln for the first round. In both cases, those schools managed to avoid being swept even as they played the role of heavy underdogs.

In 2006, Winthrop took a set from Northern Iowa at the Coliseum and pushed the Panthers throughout the entire match. In 2008, Liberty also managed to win a set from a Nebraska team that would go on to make the final four.

Without question, Nebraska’s John Cook said, the teams he’s seeing in the early rounds of the tournament are significantly better than they were a decade ago. And that’s why Coastal Carolina will have the Huskers’ full attention on Friday, the coach said.

“Those teams come here, it’s like their final four,” Cook said. “They play out of their minds, and it’s the highlight of their careers. They’re going to be emotionally charged up, and we’re going to get challenged.”

Located in Conway, S.C., near Myrtle Beach, Coastal Carolina is making its third trip to the NCAA tournament but its first since 1998. The Chanticleers put together a dramatic run through the Big South tournament, edging High Point with a five-set quarterfinal win, upsetting top-seeded UNC Asheville in a semifinal sweep and gaining revenge on second-seeded Liberty with a four-set triumph in the title match.

Picked to finish second in the conference, Coastal Carolina (20-13) struggled through an up-and-down season and instead came in fourth. The veteran-laden Chanticleers battled through a few injuries, and it took time for Bauer to solidify her rotation. But mostly, the coach said, the team simply didn’t reach its full potential until late in the season. The Chanticleers come to Lincoln with wins in four of their last five matches.

As is typically the case during first-round matchups, the Huskers will enjoy a significant height advantage. Coastal Carolina only has three players taller than 6-feet, and none over 6-1.

But as always, Cook said, that disparity can be offset if the Chanticleers serve tough, pass well and dig a lot of shots.

The Chanticleers are led by 5-9 outside hitter Chelsy Kimes, a junior who earned first-team All-Big South honors and averages 3.74 kills (fourth in the conference) and 2.72 digs per set. Sierra Livesay, a 6-foot outside hitter, was the league’s freshman of the year and averages 2.52 kills and 2.23 digs. Senior Jill Nyhof, a 6-1 middle blocker, leads the Big South with 1.26 blocks per set.

Friday’s match will be Coastal Carolina’s first against a Big 12 school, but Bauer expects her players will be emboldened by the way Liberty battled against the Huskers last December.

“We’re certainly aware of what happened last year,” Bauer said. “We’re just going to try to find something that works, and stick with it. We’re hoping that playing in front of that many people isn’t going to make us wide-eyed, and we just want to go out there and compete as hard as we did in winning the Big South championship.”

Contact the writer:

444-1207, chad.purcell@owh.com

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