The A Team Assembles, Support Grows

Part 2 of The National Football Foundation's Good in the Game Newsletter Series, “UTRGV Football — The Heart of the Valley”

Photo: UTRGV Athletics

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EDINBURG, Texas -- COVID presented a problem for UTRGV’s efforts towards adding football to campus, but luckily for the university, it was more of a speed bump than a “Road Closed” sign.

“We came out of COVID in very good shape,” UTRGV President Dr. Guy Bailey said in an interview with the National Football Foundation. “We didn’t have any of the financial problems that other institutions had. So once we got out of COVID, we called the team together.”

Athletic Director Chasse Conque assembled his A Team – Senior VP for Strategic Enrollment and Student Affairs Dr. Magdalena Hinojosa, Provost Janna Arney, VP for Government and Community Affairs Veronica Gonzales and VP for Institutional Advancement Kelly Nassour all started meeting regularly.

The verdict was that UTRGV would likely need to implement a student athletics fee to help support a new football program. But football wasn’t the only program a fee would help support – the comprehensive fee would also include a new swimming and diving team, marching band and expanded spirit squad.

In August of 2021, the group co-sponsored a proposal between the Department of Athletics and the Division of Strategic Enrollment and Student Affairs and presented it to the Student Government Association, which then took it to a vote of the student body.

“We really mapped out what this would do for our students and their student life on our campus,” Conque said, “helping them to reimagine what their engagement could be if we were to do this, and also what their engagement could be as alums.”

The vote passed that November, with the rest of the university signing on to support a new football program.

“We definitely recognized at the time and have recognized since then that there aren’t many student fee referendums, especially related to athletics or athletics fees increases that are successful,” Conque said.

Football – and the stamp of approval from each of the groups on campus – started to become the rising tide to lift all boats.

The UTRGV Foundation put forth $1 million to help support. One of the university’s largest individual donors gave $20 million to help renovate a local soccer stadium into UTRGV’s new football stadium. The school sold out its 2025 football season ticket allotment almost instantly a year before any real football would be played, with thousands more on a waitlist. 

The excitement and fan support has expanded beyond football – more than 2,500 fans showed up for the UTRGV volleyball season opener last fall, for example.

“What we’ve seen is a real awakening in our region that maybe football has helped open some eyes on, that we’ve got great Division I athletics here in the Rio Grande Valley,” Conque said. “As football has garnered that attention, they’re not just looking at the football program, they’re looking at the athletic department as a whole. They’re seeing we have competitive programs that play at a high level. They’re seeing the opportunities to engage with us.”

Enrollment has spiked since the announcement that football was a full-go, too. This year’s freshman class was over 7,000 students, compared to around 5,800 just last year.

Having primarily been a commuter campus, there is starting to be expanded interest from students to live on campus and be a part of the community UTRGV is building.

“[Football] enhances campus life,” Dr. Bailey said. “If you are at a school that is primarily a commuter school, and ours still is, the problem you have is that students come in for class and then they leave. You really don’t have anything that ties students to your campus. Athletics can be the thing that does that…It’s already had a tremendous effect on the engagement of our students on campus.”

The momentum in the Rio Grande Valley has been felt all around the state of Texas. Dr. Bailey gets phone calls asking about the university’s secret enrollment recipe. 

He tells everybody the same thing.

“People ask me, ‘What are you doing, did you change your recruitment?’ And I say, ‘No, people are aware we are adding football.’”

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The National Football Foundation sat down with UTRGV President Dr. Guy Bailey and UTRGV Athletic Director Chasse Conque last fall to discuss what it takes to build a college football program from the ground up. Stay tuned to hear more about UTRGV’s journey to kickoff in an upcoming edition of the Good in the Game newsletter!