The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley opened under its new name on Aug. 30, 2015 to mark a fresh start toward becoming a comprehensive regional university.

On Aug. 30, 2025, UTRGV kicks off another new chapter in its nearly 100-year history when the university’s Vaqueros football team plays a Division I football game in Edinburg. 

“It will be 10 years to the date we opened the university,” said Guy Bailey, the UTRGV president, at a late February event to celebrate the school’s new football program. “And what will we do? We’re going to play our first football game.”

Bailey made his remarks before more than 100 supporters of the fledgling football program. A marching band was also in attendance, with the entrance to the newly named UTRGV Stadium right behind the school’s president. The former H-E-B Park that hosted professional soccer will be repurposed to be the primary home of the UTRGV Vaqueros. The university’s football team will be a member of the United Athletic Conference. The Vaqueros will play an exhibition schedule in 2024 and start full varsity play in 2025.

The Vaqueros head football coach, Travis Bush, has extensive experience on both the college and high school levels. The UTRGV job is his first as a college head coach with past experience of being an offensive coordinator at both the University of Houston and the University of Texas San Antonio. Bush has Valley ties via his father, Bruce, who coached high school football across South Texas, including PSJA High and Donna High.

“Now we know where we will be playing,” Bush said after his university president’s remarks. “For us, it’s the final piece of our facility puzzle.”

Feeling Game Day

UTRGV’s new football home in Edinburg seats nearly 10,000 and will need some major upgrades to its locker rooms and press boxes areas before it can host college football games.

The Vaqueros will also play one home game a season in Brownsville at Sams Stadium, the football home for the city’s high schools. Playing in Brownsville reflects the fact that UTRGV has a campus there to go with its main campus in Edinburg. Chasse Conque, UTRGV’s athletic director, envisions a robust game day experience with plenty of tailgating in stadium parking lots in anticipation of kickoffs.

“We’ve got a lot of work in front of us,” Conque said. “Looking ahead, just imagine the atmosphere of the game. You can already feel it.”

UTRGV’s acquisition of the Edinburg stadium was a two-step process. The City of Edinburg first purchased the soccer stadium on Raul Longoria Road from its owner, Alonzo Cantu, a prominent McAllen developer and businessman. The stage was then set for the university to acquire the property from the city where UTRGV got its start as a junior college in 1927.

“The arrival of Division I football is a milestone for our city,” said Edinburg Mayor Ramiro Garza Jr. “It’s another piece to having a top tier university in our region.”

Bailey has overseen a number of academic and facilities improvements over the last 10 years – especially with its ever-growing medical school, which has clinics and research buildings in multiple Valley cities. Still, he said, there is something special about a university having a football team. Bailey says a college football team brings UTRGV an element it was missing.

“This will transform how people see the institution and how they will talk about it,” he said.

Getting A Team Ready

Now it’s a matter of fielding a football team.

Bush and his newly hired staff have been busy. They have thus far recruited and signed 70 student athletes to play college football. The team will eventually compete in the football-oriented United Athletic Conference. Its 11 members include fellow Texas schools Abilene Christian University, Stephen F. Austin University and Tarleton State University. The remaining schools in the UAC are from Arkansas, Alabama, Kentucky, Georgia and Utah. 

“We’re 548 days away,” Bush said at the late-February event in looking ahead to opening day in August 2025. “We’ve visualized game day thousands of times. We’re looking forward to getting started and making history.”