2026 B1G Basketball Previews: Nebraska Cornhuskers

Last Season

Starting center Rienk Mast had surgery on his knee following the end of the 2024 season which caused him to miss all of the 2025 season. Despite the valiant efforts of Brice Williams, Nebrasketball lacked the offensive firepower to consistently keep up with the Joneses — uhh, tournament bound teams. This would doom last year's squad to poor showings particularly on the road and put a ceiling on what they were capable of.

Two massive losing streaks in B1G play (6 games in January and 5 games at the end of the regular season) left Nebraska just outside of the race to 15th. Outside of those 11 games, Nebraska went 7-2 with big home wins against UClA, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio State (the latter two of which likely kept those teams outside of the NCAA tournament field). Nebraska then went on to be the first inaugural Crown champion. I'd laugh, but this isn't a program with a lot of postseason success so I'll applaud them instead. Job well done.

Defectors

• Four starters in Brice Williams, Juwan Gary, Rollie Worster, and Braxton Meah all graduated. They were joined by key bench piece Andrew Morgan and Ahron Ulis in running out of eligibility.
• Forward Gavin Griffiths heads back to the east coast... this time to Temple. Griffiths fell out of the rotation so this wasn't a huge surprise.
• Guard Nick Janowski transferred to St. Thomas after redshirting. Janowski was a top 150 recruit and had led his HS team to three state titles and a runner-up finish. This is an unfortunate loss and I think I'd rather have Janowski than the player Nebraska got in the St. Thomas trade.

Starters

• PG Jamarques Lawrence, 6'3" Senior. Lawrence returns to Nebraska follows a season in exile at Rhode Island. I'm honestly not sure why Lawrence left Nebraska in the first place since he was a starting guard for the Nebrasketball team that made the NCAA tournament under Hoiberg. He's a very good outside shooter and solid defender.
• SG Connor Essegian, 6'4" Senior. Essegian returned to being a volume outside shooter like he was his freshman year at Wisconsin and had his best season percentage yet at 38%. He can be streaky and doesn't have much value beyond shooting. Essegian may be better coming off the bench but Jacobsen and Hoiberg have their own issues and Kendall Blue will need to show he can compete at this level and play SG.
• SF Pryce Sandfort, 6'7" Junior. A transfer from Iowa, Pryce isn't his brother Payton but he's an effective scorer. Sandfort will stretch the floor and at 6'7" offers intriguing length on defense.
• PF Berke Buyuktuncel, 6'10" Junior. The lone returning starter from last season, Buyuktuncel is a good rim protector and solid rebounder. He doesn't score a ton and should probably attempt less three pointers, but helps fix some of the defensive issues that occur when Hoiberg or Essegian is in the game.
• C Rienk Mast, 6'10" Senior. Mast missed all of last season after being one of the key contributors to their 2024 NCAA tournament bid. Mast can score from inside and outside. He's a willing passer and above average rebounder. Mast appears to be fully recovered from his knee injury - he went 8/10 from three in Nebraska's exhibition win over BYU.

Bench

• PG Sam Hoiberg, 6'0" Senior. The "walk-on" guard and son of the head coach does play and has become a serviceable backup point guard. He shoots well from three and plays with a lot of energy.
• G Cale Jacobsen, 6'4" Junior. Jacobsen actually started the exhibition game against BYU but ended up playing less minutes than Hoiberg or Essegian. Jacobsen is a walk-on but offers another high energy player for Hoiberg to inject into his lineup.
• G/F Kendall Blue, 6'6" Senior. It's possible Blue is behind Hoiberg or Essegian as he adjusts to this level, but he was a tremendous player in the Summit League at St. Thomas last season. Blue shot 42% from three last year playing PF for the Tommies. He's a stat stuffer but could struggle until he finds his feet.
• G Quentin Rhymes, 6'6", Freshman. Rhymes did not play in the exhibition game. He may end up redshirting especially since Nebraska likes to play just two guards.
• F Braden Frager, 6'6" Freeshman. Frager redshirted for Nebraska last season. He's a Lincoln native and was the top recruit out of Nebraska for his class. Frager is a good athlete but his production is unproven. He looks to be the first forward off the bench. Since Buyuktuncel can play center in addition to PF, Frager could see a lot of minutes.
• F Jared Garcia, 6'8" Senior. Garcia was a starter at Tulsa where he averaged 9.4 points and 6 rebounds per game. I expected him to be in front of Frager in the rotation, but he certainly wasn't for the exhibition.
• F Will Cooper, 6'6" Sophomore. Cooper transferred in from the Air Force. He appears to be buried on the depth chart for this season.
• C Ugnius Jarusevicius, 6'10" Senior. Jarusevicius transferred from Central Michigan after being a good post scorer in the MAC. He's dealing with a lingering back injury at the moment. His status is unknown.
• C Leo Curtis, 7'1" Freshman. Curtis is a backup center that should really only play when foul trouble becomes an issue. If Jarusevicius is healthy, Curtis could redshirt. The 4 star Icelander has been playing basketball in the US already.

Outlook

There are good starters for Nebraska and the pieces should fit together well. The Cornhuskers will take lots of threes and stretch opposing defenses while using their forwards' lengths to cause defensive issues and be better on the boards than they were last year. The key question is the bench depth. There's unproven freshmen, transfers, and a couple of high-energy walk-ons. If the bench steps up, they can be a bubble team. If they don't, Nebraska could lose a lot of close games during the bench minutes.

Torvik projects Nebraska at 9-11 in the Big Ten. That's probably not good enough for a NCAA tournament bid given their weak non-conference schedule, but with some good bounces you can see a run at the bubble.