Nebraska volleyball team sets world record for largest crowd at women’s sporting event

The biggest crowd for a women's sporting event in the history of the planet took place in the southeast corner of Nebraska at a college volleyball game.

It was an epic scene at Wednesday's University of Nebraska women's volleyball game when 92,003 fans packed into the school's football stadium in Lincoln to set a record.

The sea of fans decked out in the school's red and white colors exceeded the previous world record for a women's sporting event of 91,648 fans at a Champions League soccer game last year in Barcelona, Spain, between FC Barcelona and Wolfsburg.

School officials dubbed it "Volleyball Day in Nebraska," and students were given the day off from classes to attend the game.

“It’s incredible. I don’t have enough words to describe it,” Nebraska middle blocker Andi Jackson told ESPN. “We were walking out of the tunnel after the second set, and we heard on the speaker we had just broken the world record. Everyone was trying to stay locked in, but we were also so excited. I can’t describe how grateful I am to be a part of it.”

Previously, the largest crowd at a women's sporting event on U.S. soil was at the 1999 Women's World Cup final between the U.S. Women's National Team and China at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. That crowd registered 90,185 fans.

That was the game where Brandi Chastain famously celebrated her game-winning penalty kick by pulling off her jersey and sliding to her knees in her black sports bra.

The Nebraska women's volleyball program is a powerhouse that has won five NCAA titles. They normally play in an 8,000-seat arena, where they have sold out an NCAA-record 306 straight matches, but showed they're capable of drawing a bigger crowd than even the school's football team.

Extra seating was added around the court that resulted in the record total, which exceeded the school record of 91,585 fans at Nebraska’s home football victory over Miami in 2014.

Nebraska has now played in front of nine of the 10 biggest crowds in for a collegiate volleyball match in history, according to The Athletic.

They obliterated the previous record for the biggest crowd to watch a women's NCAA volleyball match, which came in 2021 when 18,755 fans watched Wisconsin defeat Nebraska in the national championship game in Columbus, Ohio, according to Nebraska's website.

Just like the football team, the players had a walk through the tunnel to emerge to thunderous applause in the pregame. The Big Ten Network captured the euphoric scene in a video shared on X, formerly known as Twitter.

The Cornhuskers rolled to a 3-0 victory over in-state rival Omaha in front of the roaring crowd at Memorial Stadium.

“I’ve been saying it’s so huge for little girls to get to see a women’s sport and volleyball being played on this big of a stage and having so many people invest in it,” Nebraska junior Lexi Rodriguez told ESPN. “When you’re little, you have big dreams and big goals. Having this to look up to is something that a lot of little girls will keep in the back of their mind when they’re pursuing the sport of volleyball.”

This article was originally published on TODAY.com