League One Volleyball Hires Ex-Nike Exec As First Commissioner

League One Volleyball has a commissioner. 

LOVB Pro has hired former Nike executive and Brown basketball player Sandra Idehen as its first commissioner. The league was led by president Rosie Spaulding from 2020 through its launch and inaugural season.

“It’s an incredible moment for women’s sports,” Idehen told Front Office Sports. “There’s no better place to be than in the No. 1 girls’ sport in the U.S.” 

Idehen had been a VP for Jordan Brand before taking over the volleyball league.

Spaulding will work alongside Idehen the rest of the 2026 season before she takes on an advisory role. 

LOVB used an external search company for the hiring process. First on Idehen’s to-do list is to solidify LOVB’s status in the volleyball ecosystem. 

“We’re already highly regarded as one of the top three… leagues in the world,” Idehen said. “The goal is to do everything that needs to be done to get us to No. 1.”  (LOVB is in an increasingly crowded and well-funded pro volleyball landscape in the United States.)

LOVB completed its inaugural season with six teams in Atlanta, Austin, Houston, Madison, Omaha, and Salt Lake City. In 2027, the league plans to add teams in Los Angeles, Minnesota, and San Francisco. 

The league launched with a single-entity ownership model and Spaulding said the integration of new ownership groups happened at an accelerated pace. Her original expectation was that the league would expand in years three to five; she expects the league to operate at nine teams for the next “couple of years.” 

The nine cities LOVB has teams in came from a list of 13 markets the league was initially evaluating. Spaulding declined to name the four other markets, but said those remain in consideration. 

Idehen spent her first day with LOVB on Tuesday in San Francisco onboarding with Spaulding. She plans to attend her first match as commissioner on Friday in Omaha.

“The first thing I’m doing in Omaha is actually going to serve and pass so I can spend time with the players,”  Idehen said. “As someone who is a former athlete, that’s going to be one of the key pillars of the way I plan to lead as commissioner… I want to make sure I maintain the way we’ve had our athletes at the center.”