A former Opal and basketballer for the New York Liberty, she has called the iconic Madison Square Garden home.

Playing on the hallowed court of MSG for the first time as she did 17 years ago, however, does not compare to the occasion awaiting this 37-year-old Australian on Saturday.

At least not in the mind of the 37-year-old Australian in question.

Long retired as an AFL men's premiership season venue, Carlton's Princes Park might be decidedly tired in corners. But it is sporting nirvana to Bibby, the WNBL games record-holder and former Canberra Capitals captain playing just her second full AFL match this weekend in a remarkable sporting renaissance as a Greater Western Sydney footballer.

Bibby grew up a Carlton supporter, can reel off bygone player names and milestone dates she witnessed first-hand when she was a navy-blue obsessed kid. Her grandmother was a Carlton supporter but her Australian rules pedigree ran even deeper. Bibby's grandfather – Frank – was a president of Fitzroy Football Club, Robert Walls her school teacher at Park Orchards primary in a year he coached the Blues to a premiership.

"Grandpa was a massive influence on my sporting career. He taught me how to catch a ball, used to kick the footy with me and throw a tennis ball and a basketball. We would go to at least Waverley Park every week but we'd usually go to two games every weekend. But for some reason I went with grandma, I went with Carlton," Bibby recalled this week.

"I wore No. 11 as a basketball player for Bruce Doull. When he retired after the '86 grand final I was six years old, but still the influence he had on me as my favourite player was the reason I wore that number. Robert Walls was my grade-three school teacher in Melbourne, and in 1987 when Carlton won the premiership he was teaching me at school.

"His face I still remember so vividly. He was just a really great PE teacher. He was the pied piper that everyone wanted to be around. His sons went to the school and everyone knew at that stage he coached in VFL and it was a really exciting time around the school just because he did coach Carlton to the premiership that year I was at school with him."

Now, in round two of the first AFL women's season, Princes Park is Bibby's playground.

"Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined this was possible," she said in the countdown.

"Madison Square Garden is obviously very special but special because you're told it is growing up, and you watch TV and New York is larger than life.

"But the fact I watched Carlton play at Princes Park from the time I was a little girl takes it to the next level. Taking nothing away from how wonderful playing at Madison Square Garden was, the opportunity to play at Princes Park for me is on another level for me."

Barring an unforeseen explosion of her sinuses, the flu Bibby has battled all week in the lead-up to the game is no chance of getting in her way of taking the field for GWS.

The second-oldest player in the AFLW, Bibby is deeply motivated by the challenge of learning to play a new sport – albeit one she has watched so closely – at this stage of her life.

"The concentration required just to get through every training session I am relishing. I'm not familiar with any of the drills or the terminology. There's two rookies, two of us, that haven't played before, so I've literally just had to position myself at the back of lines and have my brain working overtime to pick up what I need to be doing to be successful in a drill.

"In the two hours or whatever it is that we're practising I really have no idea what's going on. It's the absolute challenge that I was after."

Guilty of more errors than they'd like to produce again in one match, the Giants were beaten soundly on the road last week by Adelaide. It has not curbed the enthusiasm of Bibby, one of the Giants' many human sponges for AFL playing knowledge who in just the third week of pre-season training fractured two fingers in four places and ruptured two tendons in her left hand.

"The result was obviously disappointing but my teammates were amazing after the game," Bibby reflected.

"The fact that I was able to play well was about the teaching that they've done for me. They literally spent the whole game instructing me and helping me with my positioning and those types of things. Just being really encouraging. They really made last Saturday very special."

Jessica Bibby, 37, Greater Western Sydney

394 WNBL games – games record-holder

Joined WNBA side New York Liberty in 2000