The Bob Devaney Sports Center (commonly shortened to Devaney Center) is a sports complex on the campus of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in Lincoln, Nebraska. The facility, opened in 1976 as the NU Sports Complex, was named for football coach and athletic director Bob Devaney in 1978, and its main arena was dedicated as John Cook Arena in 2025.
The facility was built to replace the smaller NU Coliseum as the university's primary indoor athletic venue. It hosted men's and women's basketball for thirty-seven years until both programs moved off campus in 2013. Volleyball and wrestling relocated to the vacated Devaney Center, which was extensively modernized and had its main arena shrunk to a capacity of approximately 8,000. Nebraska has led collegiate volleyball in attendance each year at the venue. The sprawling complex also hosts gymnastics, indoor track and field, and swimming and diving events.
Planning and construction
Nebraska football coach and athletic director Bob Devaney began campaigning for a new multi-sport arena as early as 1971, earning Board of Regents approval two years later. In 1974, construction began northeast of campus on the Nebraska State Fairgrounds, which would later be purchased by the university from the City of Lincoln. The $13.8-million project was financed using 2.5 of 13 cents allocated to a general university fund from a decades-old state cigarette tax, earning it the nickname "the house that cigarettes built."
When it opened in March 1976, the NU Sports Complex replaced the NU Coliseum as the home of most of the university's indoor sports. It had an arena capacity of 15,000,