On the volleyball court, three-time All-American Sarah Pavan needs setter Rachel Holloway to put the volleyball in the right places.

But, in the kitchen, that’s where Pavan is often left to be a one-woman team.

“The other ones don’t really know what they’re doing,” said Pavan, who shares a happy home with Holloway and two other Nebraska teammates.

“Our personalities are such that we are so different that we can go our separate ways when we need to, but at the same time we can stay really close friends,” Pavan added. “I think we’ve surprised everybody by making it work.”

Tonight and Saturday, the NU Coliseum will be home to Husker volleyball for another weekend. But for more than a year, there has been another, oftentimes quiet, but on occasion noisy, home for the Huskers in north Lincoln.

Upstairs live Maggie Griffin and Rachel Schwartz, roommates since they first moved into the dorms in 2005. Downstairs is home to Pavan and Holloway.

“Rachel and Sarah are best friends, and Maggie’s my best friend,” said Schwartz, who jokingly has defined the roles of her housemates.

The dad is Griffin, who handles the rent checks and, on occasion, has to come down hard when the funds run short.

Pavan, who cooks and cleans, is the mom, while Holloway and Schwartz are the “young’uns.” Holloway drew the tag of little brother.

“Rachel said something about me beating her up,” Holloway said. “I’m stronger than her, I guess.”

It’s not unusual for college athletes to live together, but for four players on a roster of 14 to be together as much as they are naturally and then to live under the same roof was something that NU coach John Cook feared was a recipe for disaster.

For one, Griffin and Holloway were destined to battle for the starting setter spot last season, which can lead to further irritability when someone leaves their book bag on the floor or doesn’t put the dishes away.

“I remember when I first found out I wasn’t starting. I came home and it was just awkward,” Griffin said. “We just kind of minded our own business about the issue and moved on.”

When Griffin led Nebraska to a brilliant night offensively on Senior Night, it was a match that Holloway will always remember.

“When I watched Saturday night unfold, it just really hit me how close those guys are,” Cook said.

A 10-minute drive from the Coliseum, their house sits out in the boonies, says Schwartz, the junior libero who grew up in Lincoln.

Part of a newer development where the college population is evident by all the cars parked along the street, it seems oddly out of place with cows grazing in a nearby field.

Each bedroom — two located upstairs and two in the basement —has a bathroom. The family room, or “chill room” as Schwartz calls it, is at the bottom of the stairs and features a 52-inch TV. There, if you were keeping a Nielsen book, shows such as “Grey’s Anatomy,” “The Hills,” “Project Runway” and “America’s Next Top Model” would be even bigger hits.

“We sit down there and, honestly, we just watch TV and laugh about stuff,” said Griffin, who is the self-proclaimed night owl of the bunch. Schwartz, on the other hand, sometimes goes to bed at 9 p.m.

“I don’t know how she does that,” Griffin said.

Holloway’s bond with Pavan began in 2005, Holloway’s redshirt season. Just as Pavan had struggled with being homesick during her first weeks in Lincoln, she saw the same symptoms coming from Holloway during a road trip to Minnesota.

“I went up to her and asked, ‘Are you OK?’, and she lost it,” Pavan recalled this week.

The tears were flowing again last Saturday when the Coliseum fans said goodbye to Pavan and Griffin on Senior Night. For Schwartz and Holloway, it was an all-too-soon dose of reality that not only are the four players down to their final days as teammates, life at home will never be the same.

Once Pavan and Griffin graduate in May, the four players plan to give up their place. And just as the grass was finally starting to grow.

“Anytime you get four players together, you can potentially have problems,” Cook said. “Mostly, they can get sick of each other.

“But they work through their differences, and it’s a pretty special deal they’ve got going there.”

The perfect mix. Even if you’re the one doing the cooking.

Reach Todd Henrichs at 473-7320 or thenrichs@journalstar.com.