'Storybook ending': Nebraska earns first NCAA tournament win - ESPN

OKLAHOMA CITY — With a little more than two minutes until his team officially made history, Nebraska coach Fred Hoiberg sent in a pair of substitutes to relieve junior forwards Pryce Sandfort and Berke Buyuktuncel.

The overwhelmingly pro-Huskers crowd roared to life, just as it had throughout the landmark afternoon as No. 4 seed Nebraska captured its first-ever NCAA tournament win in a 76-47 drubbing of No. 13 seed Troy, raucously celebrating two of the men who helped the program finally capture the milestone that had eluded them in their past eight trips to the Big Dance. The pair joined senior guard Jamarques Lawrence and senior forward Rienk Mast on the bench, where they began soaking in the atmosphere and the impending victory.

«The five-minute mark hit, and you kind of know like, 'Hey, this one's in the pocket,'» said Mast, who put up 11 points, six rebounds and seven assists. «You start looking around and just the amount of smiles you see from everyone in the crowd. It was truly special.»

Less than 30 seconds later, Hoiberg pulled his son Sam Hoiberg and sixth man Braden Frager for an ovation of their own. When the final horn blew, the Huskers emptied the bench, embracing each other, their coaches and longtime program staffers as they set a new single-season program record with 27 wins.

The moment was the culmination of seven seasons of hard work by Fred Hoiberg, who had three consecutive losing seasons to start his tenure as Nebraska's head coach from 2019 to 2022. But after going 16-16 in 2022-23, Nebraska has three consecutive seasons with at least 20 wins, plus two NCAA tournament berths and now a tournament victory.

«It's almost like a storybook ending in this tournament win,» said Sam Hoiberg, a fourth-year