Since finishing her collegiate career at Texas, volleyball star Chiaka Ogbogu has spent a large portion of her time in Europe. She played for volleyball clubs in Italy and Poland because that’s where there were opportunities for women to play professional volleyball. While she’s won gold (2020) and silver (2024) in the Olympics with the U.S., she hasn’t been able to play on home soil very often since she became the Longhorns’ all-time blocks leader.

League One Volleyball (LOVB) has changed that for Ogbogu and dozens of other American volleyball stars. The new league, which started its season on January 8, is backed by actors Amy Schumer and Chelsea Handler, and athletes Candace Parker, Lindsey Vonn and Kevin Durant. Armed with the slogan, “Volleyball is the next major league,” LOVB wants to capitalize on the popularity of the sport at the collegiate and Olympic levels while giving athletes a place to play in the U.S.

“It means the world, mainly because for myself, I've played overseas for the past seven years," Ogbogu told Yahoo Sports. "It's been really hard at times to just feel like you have a connection to your family and friends who grew up watching you play and now feel so disconnected. But now we have the opportunity for our family and friends to watch us play here in our own backyard.”

The NCAA championship game between Penn State and Louisville in December was the most-watched women’s collegiate match ever, peaking with 2.1 million viewers. LOVB gives fans a chance to follow those athletes beyond college and the Olympics.

“After the Olympics, there's a lot of buzz," Ogbogu said. "The USA volleyball team has always had success, but then after that, there's like, no real way to continue that momentum, so it just kind of dies off until the next Olympics. And selfishly, as someone who loves volleyball, it's always felt a little bit unfair that, like we don't have a lot of support, or a lot of excitement around our sport, and the only time we do is in that month period during the Olympics or following it. So it's cool to now finally have something that fans can follow past the Olympics. There's so many other players that they can follow, too, who aren't on the Olympic team."

LOVB consists of six pro teams, based in Atlanta, Austin, Houston, Omaha, Salt Lake and Madison, Wisconsin. Each roster features around 15 players, with a head coach, assistant coach and director of volleyball operations/technical director. LOVB matches will run through April, including the mid-February LOVB Classic in Kansas City, and concluding with the LOVB Finals in Louisville from April 10-13.

Ogbogu, who's on LOVB Austin, is one of LOVB’s 11 founding athletes, so she has been involved in the development of the league. She heard about the start of a new league as early as 2020, and became more involved in 2023.

“Since the beginning of last year, I have had more involvement in it," she said. "The league would meet with us every two weeks, just to kind of go over logistics, things that we would like to see in the league, which is really cool. I don't know how many leagues honestly care about the opinion of the athletes, to be honest. So it's been really fun to be involved in a lot of the decision making. I think for a lot of us, it's been cool to kind of see the business side of things a little bit, and kind of get a glimpse of what could be a lot of our futures in this sport.”

It’s not just about having a league to play in for Ogbogu and her colleagues, though. She pointed out that the league will give fans more ways to see their favorite sport.

“I think what fans will love is this league is making it a priority to not only support the athletes and what we need, but to truly make this an enjoyable fan experience for everyone," Ogbogu said. "There's been so many meetings about how we can keep the fans engaged and excited, not only those who are watching at home, but who are actually in the venues watching us play, the whole fan experience, I think is a major part of what this league is trying to do.”

LOVB matches will air on ESPN and the LOVB website.