When you think of the highest attendance for any women’s sporting event, your mind likely turns to the Women’s World Cup, the most popular event on the women’s sports calendar. While the 1999 World Cup championship between the U.S. and China at the Rose Bowl once set the world record with 90,185 fans (later beaten by a Champions League Semifinal match between Barcelona and Wolfsburg), that effort was topped on August 30th, 2023, when the Nebraska Cornhuskers defeated Omaha 3-0 in a college volleyball game in front of 92,003 supporters. The Huskers, who own several volleyball attendance records and have won five national championships, played the game outdoors at Memorial Stadium, the home of Nebraska football.
Over the last couple of decades, Cornhusker volleyball has boomed in popularity, posting 306 consecutive sellout crowds. Their following stems from their sustained success, but also from the unfortunate lack of good teams that Nebraskans have to root for. After all, Nebraska has no Big Four sports franchises, and the once dominant Nebraska football program, which won five national championships before 2000, has posted six consecutive losing campaigns.
On the day of the widely anticipated match, coined “Volleyball Day in Nebraska,” classes were canceled, and a crowd larger than the third populous city in Nebraska filled Memorial Stadium. When the idea for the game in the 100-year-old mammoth of a stadium was proposed, longtime volleyball coach John Cook doubted that his team would be able to sell out the arena, which has a capacity north of 85,000. In fact, he suggested adding a musical performance to draw out a larger crowd. However, in the first three days of ticket sales, 82,000 tickets were sold, even before the performance of country artist Scotty McCreery was announced.
Cook, who remembers the U.S. soccer match against China in 1999, hopes that interest in volleyball increases similarly to how it did for women’s soccer following that event. If nothing else, it will surely inspire the next generation of volleyball players who dream of one day playing for Nebraska. However, this event could also come to represent something larger. The NCAA currently receives almost all of its profits from men’s football and basketball, but the recent support for women’s volleyball could be a sign that the sport is on its way to a bigger stage in the future. By selling out Memorial Stadium, Nebraska volleyball sets the stage for more large-scale volleyball matches in bigger arenas in Nebraska and at other schools around the country. Despite the long road to this potential reality, the fact that a women’s sport can take center stage in the collegiate world close to the extent of football or basketball is a major step forward for all women’s sports. Even though nationwide interest in volleyball isn’t there yet, the fans on hand to watch Nebraska play Omaha display what is possible.
This article also appears in our September 2023 print edition.
