The Omaha Supernovas (Nebraska) team has a great infrastructure and tremendous fan support // Photo: provolleyball.com
The merger deal totaled about $325 million and was overseen by Bank of America. The debut season of the merged league is scheduled to start in January 2026. In an official press release, the organizers said that “unification and modernization of the business model helps to attract new team owners, improve the efficiency of the mechanisms for managing the league and bring an innovative approach to the opportunities for players off the court and interaction with fans”.
The DeVos family were the primary investors in the project and convinced the management of both leagues to merge. Previously, the DeVos family’s sports interests were only in basketball – it owns the Orlando Magic, an NBA club. Michigan entrepreneur Richard DeVos, who made his fortune with the AmWay cleaning products company, owned the club since 1991, and when he died in 2018, it was passed to his four children in his will, along with a $5.4 billion fortune. The Orlando Magic basketball club is valued at $3.55 billion.
Among the reasons for the merger of MLV with PVF experts say that the first league lacks the necessary infrastructure and a sufficient number of employees for stable functioning. In turn, the PVF league, founded in 2023, has managed to prove itself from the best side both organizationally and technically.
It has developed an attractive mechanism of financial incentives – this year the salaries of PVF club players range from $60,000 to $175,000 per year, and there are also awards and bonuses for individual achievements – from $3,000 to $15,000 in one-time payments.
Attendance at PVF matches during the first two seasons totaled more than 750,000, and the All-Star Match, broadcast nationally, drew a peak television audience of more than 445,000 viewers.
Increasing interest in women’s volleyball in the United States has been observed since the 1980s and has not slowed down. Interest in the sport is fueled by the success of the U.S. women’s national team, which has won medals at five consecutive previous Olympics, including gold medals in Tokyo, Japan, in 2021 and silver medals in Paris, France, last year.
The number of clubs training juniors has been steadily growing, nearly doubling in 20 years to more than 3,800 by 2024. Last year, U.S. volleyball clubs registered a record number of young female athletes between the ages of 11 and 18 – more than 333,000, up nearly 50 percent from 10 years ago.
Volleyball in the U.S. is attractive to low-income families, as clubs provide financial support to those in need and also offer children and their parents the opportunity to try the sport for free. Most attention is given to residents of poor urban areas and Native American reservations.
The MLV-branded United League will be one of three women’s volleyball leagues in the U.S. to hold its own championships in 2026. Athletes Unlimited (AU) has held its own championship since 2021, while League One Volleyball (LOVB) has only one full season under its belt.
