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For decades, the Bay Area sports calendar featured few women’s pro sports games. Now it’s filling in quickly as new franchises are looking to capitalize on surging interest in Northern California.
As the market for women’s sports booms, a pro volleyball league is the latest entity betting that San Francisco is ready for more. League One Volleyball (LOVB (opens in new tab)) announced Thursday that it will expand to San Francisco with a women’s team debuting in January 2027.
The league, which launched this year with six teams, has announced three expansion franchises; clubs in Los Angeles and Minneapolis also debut in 2027. The San Francisco team is backed by a women-led ownership group with local ties, including three-time Olympic volleyball medalist Kelsey Robinson Cook — an Illinois native who lives in the Bay Area — and Bay FC founders Brandi Chastain, Danielle Slaton, and Leslie Osborne, plus other Olympians-turned-investors.
The league’s expansion to the Bay Area follows the region’s rapid emergence as a hub for women’s professional sports. It follows the debut of Bay FC in the NWSL in 2024, the Golden State Valkyries in the WNBA in 2025, and the addition of a San Francisco team in the Women’s Professional Baseball League set to launch next summer.
“San Francisco has an untapped market for women’s sports,” Robinson Cook said. “We can see it growing with the Valkyries, with Bay FC and how there’s been incredible fandom. You can see there’s a market for volleyball.”
Local fan interest in women’s sports isn’t the only reason LOVB views San Francisco as a natural fit. The league is built around a club-to-pro model that ties together youth programs, college teams, and a professional volleyball roster. LOVB already operates youth programs across the country, including in Redwood City, and serves more than 20,000 athletes nationwide.
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The Bay Area’s collegiate volleyball pipeline strengthens the case. Stanford, Cal, Santa Clara, San Jose State, Saint Mary’s, and the University of San Francisco have all produced elite volleyball talent, with the Cardinal standing as the most decorated program in NCAA history with nine national championships.
“One of the things that LOVB looks at when they’re thinking about expansion is what does the youth market look like,” Robinson Cook said. “And [the Bay Area] has an incredible youth market. There are so many athletes, young women that play the sport up in Northern California.”
Robinson Cook, who played professionally for 12 years overseas before joining LOVB Atlanta in the league’s inaugural season in 2025, experienced the same system abroad, where young players trained in the same facilities as professionals. “You create this connection with younger athletes who then get to dream of being in your shoes one day,” she said. “For a long time, there’s been a disconnect. And so now, face-to-face, we are bridging that gap.”
Mayor Daniel Lurie praised LOVB’s expansion announcement, calling San Franciscans “the best women’s sports fans in the country.”
“This women-led ownership group is investing in talent from youth clubs to the pro stage, and I look forward to cheering them on,” Lurie said in a statement.
Source: Courtesy of League One Volleyball
LOVB’s 14-week season runs from January through early April, a window that fits neatly into the Bay Area’s robust women’s sports lineup. The franchise’s home venue is expected to be announced in 2026, but unlike the incoming San Francisco’s WBPL team set to play its first season at a neutral site in Illinois, LOVB will play at a venue inside city limits.
Three women’s pro volleyball leagues (opens in new tab) operate as competitors in the U.S., but LOVB has become a popular destination for top talent by offering guaranteed contracts and robust benefits. In the league’s debut season, players earned a minimum of $60,000 for the 14 weeks of competition and were exempt from being cut or traded.
The league has a media rights deal with Victory+, a streaming service headquartered in Texas that holds broadcast rights for NHL teams, the Texas Rangers, and select NWSL games.
Stable rosters, a broadcaster partner with a growing platform, and basing teams in regions with strong volleyball pipelines such as Omaha, Nebraska, and Madison, Wisconsin, give Robinson Cook and others hope that LOVB can develop recognizable stars, one of the inherent challenges the sport faces.
In recent years, women’s pro soccer has benefited from the popularity of Abby Wambach (a part owner of the LOVB San Francisco team), Megan Rapinoe, and Trinity Rodman, while women’s basketball has surged in interest thanks to a plethora of dominant stars, including A’ja Wilson, Caitlin Clark, and Napheesa Collier. Women’s volleyball needs players who generate more interest in the pro ranks.
“We have an incredible opportunity with kids coming out of college who have built these audiences and can carry that audience with them,” Robinson Cook said. “There hasn’t been that chance yet to do it right.”
If it does do it right, LOVB believes it will find a big and receptive audience in San Francisco.