Less than 48 hours from tipping off the first regular-season game of the Fred Hoiberg era at Nebraska, Shamiel Stevenson was still left waiting on a decision for his immediate future.

After transferring to NU this summer by way of Nevada (by way of Pittsburgh), the Huskers’ plan for Stevenson was to submit a waiver to the NCAA to allow him to be immediately eligible for the start of the 2019-20 season.

That waiver has been submitted, and nearly 60 similar cases had already been approved around college basketball as of Monday afternoon. Yet the junior guard remained in the dark with a real chance of not being able to play in Tuesday night’s opener vs. UC-Riverside.

Should his waiver be denied, Stevenson would have to sit out until the end of the fall semester. That would require him to miss the first 11 games of the season, and his first eligible game would be at home against North Dakota on Dec. 21.

Hoiberg and his staff had dealt with plenty of transfer situations in the past, but he said this could be the first time where a player had to miss a game or games while waiting for an NCAA ruling one way or another.

“This is a first for me,” Hoiberg said.

“He’s handling it great. He’s coming to work every day; he’s practicing, getting in extra work, getting his treatments as if he’ll be eligible. We’ll see what happens with it, but I’ve been proud of Shamiel for battling through a difficult time not knowing if or when it will happen. He’s gone out with a workman-like effort and done some good things for us on the practice court.”

The 6-foot-6, 245-pound native of Toronto, Canada, originally signed with Pittsburgh and played extensive minutes for the Panthers as a true freshman in 2017-18.

Stevenson played in 32 games with 13 starts and averaged 8.5 points, 4.4 rebounds and 1.0 assist per game. He led Pitt with a 50.5-percent field goal percentage and was 37.5 percent from behind the arc. He also ranked second on the team in rebounding and got to the foul line a team-high 112 times.

After Pitt fired head coach Kevin Stallings, though, Stevenson did not mesh at all with new head coach Jeff Capel and eventually transferred in December of last season.

Stevenson ended up at Nevada, where he planned to sit out the second half of the year and be eligible to play for the Wolfpack at the end of the 2019 fall semester. But another wrench was thrown in his plans when head coach Eric Musselman left Nevada after the season to take the job at Arkansas.

Rather than play for another coach that didn’t recruit him, Stevenson hit the transfer market again and eventually wound up at Nebraska this summer.

The Huskers’ basis for the waiver was that Stevenson’s career was thrown off track not once, but twice, due to coaching changes beyond his control.

Nebraska took its time submitting, which was done intentionally to make sure that every “i” was dotted and “t” was crossed so the NCAA’s review process would, in theory, go as quickly and smoothly as possible.

Now with the season about to begin, the situation has dragged on longer than NU expected.

Senior guard Haanif Cheatham, who is roommates with Stevenson, knows as well as anyone what his teammate is going through. Cheatham applied for a waiver after transferring from Marquette to Florida Gulf Coast, with the basis being he was moving closer to his hometown and family in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Cheatham was granted his waiver and ruled eligible for the start of the 2018-19 season.

“It’s frustrating for sure,” Cheatham said. “I went through that last year trying to get (a waiver) for family stuff. It’s frustrating. You never know what they’re going to decide. If you get it, it’s a great feeling. If you don’t, you feel like you’ve got tons of pressure on your shoulders, and you don’t know what to do. But I just tell him you’ve got to stay focused, and you’ve got to get your work in, get your classwork in, and everything’s going to work out and be just fine.”

Hoiberg said Stevenson was still practicing and preparing as if he were going to be available. Whether the NCAA announced its ruling before Tuesday night’s tip or not, he said it wouldn’t dramatically change Nebraska’s game plan.

“We’re going in with a plan either way, and we have our rotations set,” Hoiberg said. “We’ll finalize that in the morning based on what we think our opponent will do. We’ll worry about the guys we have out on the floor. It shouldn’t change the way that we play.”