Published for LOVB Atlanta fans — October 2026
By Toxlay Sports Editorial Team · Last updated October 24, 2026
🏐 LOVB Atlanta Fans — Your Pink-and-Navy Pride Is Waiting!
The first serve in LOVB history was hit in Atlanta — and this team has been swinging ever since. Back-to-back semifinals, a golden-set heartbreak in 2026, and a brand-new era under Carlo Parisi: the A is rising. Wear the hot pink and be part of it.
The Club
LOVB Atlanta are where American pro volleyball’s newest league began. In March 2023, Atlanta was selected as League One Volleyball’s first pro team market, and on January 8, 2025, the club hosted LOVB Salt Lake at home in the first match in LOVB Pro history. Home is Gateway Center Arena in College Park, just south of downtown Atlanta — a loud 3,500-seat room where the pink LED boards glow with the club’s stylized “A”. The founding athlete was Kelsey Robinson Cook, the first player ever to commit to LOVB, and Atlanta has been a contender from day one: the league’s best regular-season record in 2025 (13–3) and back-to-back semifinal runs. Searching for a LOVB Atlanta jersey, the latest Atlanta schedule or Atlanta tickets? Start with the question the A asks all winter: when do LOVB Atlanta play?
⭐ FAN FAVORITE
#13 McKenzie Adams — LOVB Atlanta Style Jersey
$59.99
McKenzie Adams’ hot pink 2026 Atlanta home jersey look — fan-inspired apparel made for fans of the A.
Last Season (2026): One Golden Set Short
Atlanta’s 2026 season was a fight from the first serve. The team played the entire year without founding athlete Kelsey Cook, who announced her pregnancy in October 2025, and still finished second in the six-team league at 11–9 (35 points), behind only regular-season champions Houston. McKenzie Adams stepped into the lead role, rookie Eva Hudson — the SEC Player of the Year out of Kentucky — stepped straight into the lineup, and Atlanta swept Nebraska in Omaha and beat the eventual champions Austin 3–1 at home on February 22. In the Louisville playoffs, the semifinal against Austin went the distance: Atlanta dropped Match 1 in straight sets, won Match 2 in five behind Ivonee Montaño’s league-record night, then lost the tiebreak golden set 8–15 — one set short of the final. A year earlier, Atlanta had owned the league’s best record at 13–3, with Cook the league MVP and Adams the Outside Hitter of the Year. In 2026, they proved they could contend without their captain, too.
Best Players Right Now (2026 Roster)
McKenzie Adams, Outside Hitter (#13) — The 2025 LOVB Outside Hitter of the Year. With Cook sidelined, Adams became Atlanta’s on-court leader in 2026, after a 2025 season in which she ranked top five among league outside hitters in points (193), kills (163), digs (146), blocks (20) and aces (10). She has since joined expansion LOVB Miami for 2026/27 — but her 2026 season defined Atlanta’s.
Ivonee Montaño, Opposite Hitter (#18) — The record-breaker. In the 2026 semifinal Match 2 against Austin, the Colombian opposite produced the greatest scoring night in league history: an LOVB-record 35 points and 31 kills, hitting .306 with 14 digs and two blocks. Montaño is not on Atlanta’s announced 2026/27 roster — that night in Louisville remains hers forever.
Tia Jimerson, Middle Blocker (#14) — The hometown cornerstone: a Sugar Hill, Georgia native who came through Atlanta’s own A5 club, ranked second in the league in blocks in 2025 (52), and spent the summer of 2025 with the U.S. National Team. Best of all, she is back — one of five returnees anchoring the 2026/27 rebuild.
Piyanut Pannoy, Libero (#2) — Thailand’s national-team captain and Atlanta’s defensive anchor since the inaugural season — and the only libero on the announced 2026/27 roster.
Eva Hudson, Outside Hitter (#24) — The headline rookie: SEC Player of the Year and a national player-of-the-year finalist at Kentucky, signed on December 28, 2025 and thrown straight into the 2026 lineup. She returns for year two.
Rachel Fairbanks, Setter (#10) — A three-time AVCA All-American at Pittsburgh and a U.S. National Team setter who ran Atlanta’s offense in 2026. She has since departed to the expansion Los Angeles Orbit.
Magdalena Jehlárová, Middle Blocker (#15) — The Czech national-team middle who gave Atlanta a second tower at the net alongside Jimerson through the 2026 campaign.
Miroslava Paskova, Outside Hitter (#6) — The former captain of the Bulgarian national team, signed for her leadership and defense — and back for 2026/27.
Tessa Grubbs, Opposite Hitter (#17) — The Tennessee product who returns for 2026/27 as part of the spine of the new-look roster.
Head coach (2026): Paulo Coco — The 2025 LOVB Coach of the Year, who led Atlanta to the league’s best record in season one and a second straight semifinal in season two. Carlo Parisi takes over for 2026/27.
Star Spotlight: Stories You Should Know
Adams answers the call. When Kelsey Cook announced her pregnancy in October 2025, Atlanta’s season could have folded before it started. Instead, McKenzie Adams — already the reigning Outside Hitter of the Year — took the lead role and carried it all winter: the first option in attack, a top-five producer at her position across virtually every category the year before, and a summer with the U.S. National Team behind her. Atlanta did not just survive without its captain. Behind No. 13, it finished second in the league.
The closing chapter of the first era. Adams’ hot pink No. 13 became the look of this team — the face on the poster as the kid from the league’s first market turned Atlanta into a two-time semifinalist. Her move to expansion Miami for 2026/27 closes the club’s first era, which is exactly why her 2026 Atlanta run is the one fans will tell stories about: the year the leader’s jersey got heavier, and she wore it anyway.
One night in Louisville. April 11, 2026: Atlanta, down a match to Austin, needed a miracle to keep its season alive — and Ivonee Montaño delivered the greatest individual performance in league history. Thirty-five points. Thirty-one kills. Both LOVB single-match records, with 14 digs and two blocks for good measure, as Atlanta won Match 2 in five sets. The golden set slipped away minutes later, but the record book will carry Montaño’s name long after the heartbreak fades.
🏐 Love Atlanta? Wear it. Rep the A with fan-inspired apparel made for Atlanta fans: Shop Fan Sportswear →
🔥 More Fan Favorites
Keep the 2026 magic close — fan-inspired Atlanta apparel in hot pink and navy.
This Season (2026/27): The Parisi Rebuild
The next chapter is a genuine rebuild — and it starts on December 16, 2026, when the 2026/27 LOVB season opens with First Serve in San Antonio. The league grows from six teams to ten, adding Los Angeles, Miami, Minnesota and San Francisco, and Atlanta will look very different: only five of the 15 players from the 2026 roster return. The biggest change is on the bench — Carlo Parisi, announced on June 23, 2026, brings 30-plus years of Italian coaching pedigree, including a Serie A1 title and two CEV Cup titles, to succeed two-time semifinalist Paulo Coco. The spine remains strong — Pannoy at libero, Jimerson in the middle, Hudson a year wiser — and the newcomers include Finnish setter Kaisa Alanko, Serbian middle Mina Popović and Thai opposite Pimpichaya Kokram. The departures headline the other way: Adams to Miami, Cook to San Francisco as an owner, Fairbanks to Los Angeles. Atlanta’s own 2026/27 fixture list has not been released yet — when it drops, the A will be ready.
Mark Your Calendar: The Road Ahead
Atlanta’s 2026/27 fixture list is still to come, so circle the league’s opening night — and relive the nights that built this fan base:
- December 16, 2026 — LOVB First Serve, San Antonio: The 2026/27 season opens with an Austin–Nebraska showcase staged alongside NCAA Championship Week. Atlanta’s own first fixtures of the new season are still to be announced.
- Relive it — April 11, 2026, the semifinal, Louisville: Atlanta 3, Austin 2 in Match 2 behind Montaño’s record 35 points — before the golden-set heartbreak. The Austin rematch tops every Atlanta fan’s new-season wishlist.
- Relive it — February 22, 2026, vs Austin, Gateway Center Arena: A 3–1 statement win over the eventual back-to-back champions on Atlanta’s home floor.
- Relive it — March 18, 2026, at Nebraska, Baxter Arena: A 3–0 sweep in Omaha — answered by Nebraska in five sets in Atlanta a week later. This home-and-home is becoming appointment viewing.
- Relive it — January 8, 2025, vs Salt Lake, Gateway Center Arena: The first match in LOVB Pro history, hosted by Atlanta. Salt Lake took it 3–1 — but the history books still start in the A.
Biggest Rivalries — The Wars
1. LOVB Austin — the ones who keep ending the season. Austin has eliminated Atlanta in both LOVB postseasons: the 2025 Finals semifinal, where the No. 5 seed reverse-swept the 13–3 top seed after trailing 0–2, and the 2026 semifinal, settled in a golden set. The regular season is just as wild — back-to-back five-setters to open 2026, then Atlanta’s 3–1 home win on February 22. Until Atlanta beats them when it matters most, this is the war.
2. LOVB Houston — the other original powerhouse. The league’s two first-announced markets have traded blows from the start: five-set grinders in 2025, Houston as regular-season champions in 2026, and a 3–2 Houston win in the April 4, 2026 regular-season finale in Atlanta. A rivalry still in the making — with teeth already.
3. LOVB Nebraska — chaos, home and away. The 2026 home-and-home had everything: a Nebraska sweep in Omaha, a weather-postponed return match, an Atlanta sweep at Baxter Arena on March 18, and a Nebraska five-set answer in Atlanta on March 25. Two of the league’s loudest fan bases, trading haymakers.
4. Atlanta Vibe — the crosstown fight for the city. Honestly labeled: this one is for the fans, not the fixture list. The Vibe play in the rival MLV across town in Duluth, and the two clubs never meet on court — but they compete for the same fans, the same sponsors and the title of Atlanta’s team. Only two U.S. cities have two pro women’s volleyball teams. Atlanta is one of them.
🏐 LOVB Atlanta Fan Shop
Gear up with fan-inspired apparel made for Atlanta fans — the hot pink look.
Frequently Asked Questions
When do LOVB Atlanta play next?
LOVB Atlanta return to the court for the 2026/27 LOVB season, which opens with the league’s First Serve event on December 16, 2026 in San Antonio. Atlanta’s own fixture list for the new season has not been released yet — dates and opponents will be confirmed when the league publishes the full schedule.
Where do LOVB Atlanta play their home games?
At Gateway Center Arena in College Park, Georgia — the team’s primary home court just south of downtown Atlanta, and the floor where Atlanta hosted the first match in LOVB Pro history on January 8, 2025.
Have LOVB Atlanta ever won a championship?
Not yet. Atlanta posted the league’s best regular-season record in 2025 at 13–3 and finished second in 2026 at 11–9, reaching the semifinals in both seasons — and coming one golden set short of the final in 2026.
Where can I buy LOVB Atlanta fan gear?
Toxlay Sports offers fan-inspired apparel for Atlanta supporters — fan-designed gear made for real fans. Note that fan-inspired apparel is not official LOVB licensed merchandise.
Sources: League One Volleyball (LOVB), team announcements — schedules, rosters and records checked October 2026.
For The A — the team that hosted the first match in LOVB history is coming back hungry.
