Braden Frager Scores 26 as No. 25 Nebraska Routs Boise State 102-75 in Sioux Falls

Boise State showed up in Sioux Falls with the second-highest scoring offense in the country, a 3-0 record and a 100-81 win over Butler already on the résumé. Two hours later, the Broncos had been handed a 27-point lesson in what Big Ten size, speed and shot-making look like on a neutral floor.

No. 25 Nebraska never trailed on Sunday afternoon, shot 66.7 percent from the field and pulled away from Boise State 102-75 at the Sanford Pentagon. Braden Frager led everyone with 26 points on 8-of-11 shooting, including 3-of-4 from deep and a perfect 7-of-7 at the free throw line. Pryce Sandfort added 17 points and three steals, and Sam Orme came off the bench to score 15, every one of them after halftime.

Nebraska moved to 4-0. Boise State, which entered averaging 114.3 points per game according to Nebraska's game preview, fell to 3-1 and finished 39 points below that mark. The game aired on BTN.

A Tie, a Push, Then a Shove

For about three minutes, this looked like the shootout the numbers promised. Cale Jacobsen scored on a layup 14 seconds in, Frager hit three free throws, and the Broncos answered with 3s from Damari Wheeler-Thomas, Julian Bowie and Spencer Ahrens. Ahrens' 3 at the 17:08 mark tied it 9-9, and that was as close as Boise State got to the lead all day.

Jacobsen hit a jumper, Sandfort followed with a 3 off a Trevan Leonhardt feed, and Nebraska's bigs started to find the rim. Boden Kapke scored on a layup, Damon Wilkinson added two baskets inside, and the Broncos went from Ahrens' second 3 at 15:09 to a Dovydas Butka hook at 11:28 without a field goal. By the time Frager finished a Taj DeGourville steal with a dunk at 7:43, the Huskers led 30-17.

Boise State did not fold right away. Bowie and Wheeler-Thomas hit back-to-back 3s, Butka scored twice around the basket and Aginaldo Neto added a free throw in an 11-2 burst that cut the margin to 32-28 with 5:32 left in the half.

That was the last time the game felt competitive.

The Turning Point: A 20-6 Finish

Jacobsen scored on a layup, and Frager went to work. Frager scored on a layup off a Sandfort assist, then drew a foul from Butka and made both free throws. After a Neto 3 pulled the Broncos within 38-31, Jacobsen turned a Jerquarius Stanback turnover into a layup, and Frager buried a 3 from DeGourville to make it 44-31.

Then Sandfort took over the final 90 seconds. Sandfort scored on a layup at 1:15, picked off Stanback on the next trip and laid it in at 1:10, and after two more Frager free throws, beat the halftime horn with another layup at the 0:06 mark. Nebraska closed the half on a 20-6 run, finished it with eight straight points and went to the locker room up 52-34.

Frager had 16 by the break. The Broncos had been outscored by 18 in a half in which they made eight 3-pointers, which says plenty about what was happening inside the arc.

Orme's Three-Minute Flurry

Any thought of a Boise State comeback ended in the first four minutes of the second half. Frager opened it with a 3, Kapke turned a Wheeler-Thomas turnover into a layup, and Frager hit another 3 from Sandfort before Kapke finished an and-one at 16:24. The lead was 63-39.

The Broncos kept firing. Ahrens hit a jumper and Neto added a 3 to pull within 63-44 at the 15:00 mark. Orme, held scoreless in the first half, answered with a 3 from Sandfort at 14:48. After Sandfort and Ahrens traded 3s and Butka scored inside, Orme hit two more from deep, at 12:50 and 12:10, and the lead was 75-49.

Orme was not done. Orme scored on a layup, threw down a dunk off a Frager assist and finished a cutting layup from DeGourville, going 6-of-9 overall and 3-of-6 from 3. For a bench player who had been quiet through the first 20 minutes, it was a loud second half.

Frager added a cutting dunk and a layup to push the lead to 86-59 with 6:28 left. Sandfort's free throws at 4:34 made it 90-62. In the final two minutes, Connor Essegian hit a pair of 3s, the second at the 0:26 mark for 102-72, the largest lead of the game. Bhan Buom's 3 with 15 seconds left set the final.

Efficiency Beats Volume

Nebraska's shooting line was absurd. The Huskers made 38 of 57 shots, 12 of 24 from 3 and 14 of 18 free throws. They assisted on 26 of their 38 baskets, with DeGourville handing out eight assists in 22 minutes off the bench and Jacobsen adding four.

Jacobsen also scored 13 on 5-of-7 shooting with six rebounds and two steals. Kapke scored 13 on 6-of-10 shooting, and Wilkinson added seven points, four rebounds and a block in 17 minutes. Leonhardt did not score but chipped in three rebounds, two assists and a steal.

Nebraska won the glass 35-24, the paint 50-22, the fast-break battle 27-10 and the bench battle 33-8. The Huskers did commit 17 turnovers, two more than Boise State, and Jacob Lanier was whistled for a flagrant 1 with 2:32 left, but those were small blemishes on an afternoon when nearly every Nebraska possession ended in a quality look.

Sandfort, a preseason All-American according to the school, had a quieter scoring day than usual after entering with four straight 20-point games, per Nebraska's preview. Sandfort still made 6 of 9 shots, played 31 minutes without a turnover and kept the defense moving, which is about as efficient as a down day gets.

Boise State Runs Into a Wall

Ahrens and Neto each scored 17 for the Broncos, but it took them a combined 31 shots. Ahrens went 6-of-17 and 4-of-12 from 3. Neto, a sophomore guard who entered averaging 20 points and six assists per game according to Nebraska's preview, went 5-of-14 with five assists and five turnovers.

Wheeler-Thomas, the North Dakota State transfer, scored 14 with eight assists and made 6 of 8 free throws. Butka, the Campbell transfer, added 13 points on 6-of-11 shooting and seven rebounds. Bowie scored six, all on 3s in the first half.

The bigger problem was depth and the paint. Boise State's bench scored eight points, with Ethan Lathan's two second-half baskets the only bench field goals until Buom's late 3. Pearson Carmichael played 24 minutes and went 0-of-4. The Broncos shot 37.9 percent overall and 13-of-35 from 3, and with Nebraska owning the paint 50-22, the 3-point line became the only reliable path to points. The Broncos did win the second-chance battle 9-2 on eight offensive rebounds, but that was one of the few columns that tilted their way.

What It Means

For Nebraska, this was the best résumé moment of the young season. The Huskers had already beaten Le Moyne 106-64, Providence at Mohegan Sun and Lindenwood 94-60, a game Undrafted covered in its recap of the Lindenwood rout. Boise State was the first opponent with a real offensive identity, and Fred Hoiberg's team turned that identity into an afterthought.

It also extended a streak the program tracks closely. Nebraska entered with 27 straight non-conference wins, dating to a loss to Saint Mary's on Nov. 17, 2024, according to the school's preview, and that run is now at 28. It was the second meeting between the programs, and Nebraska is now 2-0 after a 79-69 win in the 2025 College Basketball Crown semifinal in Las Vegas.

The depth is the story to watch. Frager, the Big Ten Sixth Man of the Year last season, started and led the team in scoring, Orme gave the bench a second-half scorer, and DeGourville ran the second unit like a starter. That is a lot of answers for a team that just entered the Nov. 9 men's AP Top 25 at No. 25.

For Boise State, there is no shame in losing to a ranked Big Ten team on a neutral floor in mid-November, but the margin will sting. A team built to win track meets ran into one that was faster, bigger and more efficient, and the Broncos will need more interior production and more from the bench before the schedule toughens. For full stats, see the CBS Sports box score (opens in a new tab) and Nebraska's game preview (opens in a new tab).

Sources: official Sanford Pentagon live stats, CBS Sports box score and play-by-play, Nebraska Athletics schedule and game preview, Boise State Athletics schedule, SI's Boise State roster coverage. More men's college basketball coverage on Undrafted.

Nebraska hosts South Dakota at Pinnacle Bank Arena on Wednesday, Nov. 18, then meets Butler in Chicago on Sunday, Nov. 22, a matchup with a built-in measuring stick after Boise State's 100-81 win over the Bulldogs on Nov. 8. Leon Rice's Broncos face Sam Houston on Friday, Nov. 20.

Photo: Scott Bruhn/Nebraska Athletics (file photo from Nov. 11, 2026, vs. Lindenwood).