Short Bio for Speaking Engagements
During his first six years as at UTRGV, Chasse Conque (pronounced Chase Konk), now the Senior Vice President and Director of Athletics, has led the department through a period of exponential growth. Among his accomplishments are nearly doubling attendance across all sports, generating over $38 million in external revenue, including an unprecedented $24.5 million during fiscal year 2024, and nearly tripling the department’s budget.
Conque is currently presiding over $180 million in facilities enhancements across 13 capital projects taking place from 2022-26 touching all 18 athletic programs at UTRGV.
The remarkable support during Conque’s tenure allowed UTRGV to move forward with starting football in 2025 and women’s swimming & diving in 2024-25 while making a move to the Southland Conference as full-time members in 2024-25.
UTRGV made history in the Rio Grande Valley on August 30, 2025, as 12,746 fans packed Robert & Janet Vackar Stadium to root on the Valley’s first Division I college football team. In their inaugural game, the Vaqueros cruised to a 66-0 win over Sul Ross State.
In recognition of his impact on UTRGV and the Rio Grande Valley, Conque was promoted to senior vice president in June 2025. He was also named the 2024 Edinburg Chamber of Commerce Man of the Year.
#RallyTheValley
During his introductory press conference in Aug. 2019, Conque stated his intention to “Rally the Valley” behind UTRGV Athletics. #RallyTheValley has become both a rallying cry and a hashtag for not only athletics, but the university, as its meaning has grown to mean both rallying the Valley behind UTRGV and UTRGV rallying in support of the Rio Grande Valley.
UTRGV Athletics has rallied behind the Valley in a big way during Conque’s tenure, ranking 16th in NCAA Division I in community service hours in 2024-25 (4,475) after ranking sixth in 2023-24 (5,042) seventh in 2022-23 (3,706), eighth in 2021-22 (2,433), and 20th in 2019-20 (1,526).
Conque has placed an emphasis on bringing UTRGV Athletics to both campuses, spearheading a Cameron County initiative that has seen the soccer and tennis teams play competitions, including the 2024 WAC Tennis Tournaments, and multiple teams host youth clinics in Brownsville and Harlingen. Additionally, both basketball teams played on South Padre Island in 2021-22 and 2022-23.
The Valley has responded in a meaningful way, breaking single-season and single-game attendance records for multiple sports while providing record financial support.
Attendance
UTRGV Athletics shattered multiple attendance records for the fourth-straight year in 2024-25, with all sports combining to welcome over 147,569 fans, a department record.
The baseball team ranked 34th in the nation in attendance, drawing a program record 84,258 fans. UTRGV had the sixth best overall attendance outside of the Power 4 while welcoming the first, third, and fourth largest crowds in program history and seven of the program's 11 largest crowds since moving into UTRGV Baseball Stadium in 2002.
Volleyball broke the program record for overall and average attendance during the 2024 season by drawing 13,386 fans across 10 contests and averaging 1,339 fans per match.
Community Investment
Conque and his team have achieved unprecedented fundraising, including a $20 million dollar gift from Robert and Janet Vackar in March 2024 that is believed to be one of the 40 largest in the history of college athletics. In 2024-25, UTRGV Athletics generated nearly $7.7 million with a department record $872,395 in corporate sponsorship revenue and a department record $630,010 in ticket sales.
Licensing
The UTRGV Vaqueros can now be found in stores, banks and restaurants across the Valley, as UTRGV Athletics has partnered with 5x5 Brewing Co. in Mission to create the first branded beer in the UT System – Los Vaqueros, Tio Pelon’s, whose founders are from McAllen, to create Vaqueros Especial Salsita, Texas Regional Bank to launch the UTRGV debit card, The Jank, whose founder lives in Weslaco, to create Vaqueros Gourmet Barbecue Sauce, and Reserva Coffee to launch Vaqueros Roast, an organic UTRGV-branded coffee meticulously curated by both organizations.
Additionally, UTRGV is one of just 28 college football teams in the nation to have a branded Bud Light can during the 2025 season.
Academics
Academically, UTRGV student-athletes have thrived, achieving a department record 3.35 cumulative grade point average and a department record 993 Academic Progress Rate in 2024-25. During Conque’s tenure, UTRGV student-athletes have earned 712 academic all-conference awards and 2,091 AD Honor Roll awards. After initially honoring student-athletes with a semester GPA of at least 3.0, Conque moved to raise the bar for the AD Honor Roll, increasing the threshold to 3.25 for the 2021-22 academic year.
The commitment to academics extends beyond the student-athletes, as Conque has built a strong working relationship with the UTRGV Student Government Association to promote internships and student employment opportunities in the department.
UTRGV Athletics is also partnering with the Hospitality and Tourism Management program to give students opportunities for real-world, hands-on experience by assisting with the implementation of UTRGV athletic events. Additionally, UTRGV Athletics currently is employing over 200 student workers in 2025-26.
Facilities
Over the last year, UTRGV has completed three more capital projects, including the Vaqueros Performance Center, Robert & Janet Vackar Stadium, and the UTRGV Fieldhouse.
Vaqueros Performance Center
In September 2025, UTRGV Athletics unveiled the $45 million Vaqueros Performance Center, a 45,000+ square foot facility that houses the football program and features state-of-the-art weight training, academic, and sports medicine facilities for use by multiple teams. The VPC also features two practice fields, one of which is the same synthetic turf used at Robert & Janet Vackar Stadium and one of which is natural grass. The turf field is striped for both football and soccer.
The VPC features a 4,973-square foot locker room area for the football team with 120 lockers and a players lounge. The Vaqueros can take advantage of a 1,674-square foot team room with 143 seats and large screen for watching film as well as six position meeting rooms.
The VPC is home to a 3,837-square foot sport medicine area, primarily used by the football and swimming & diving teams, that includes an on-site x-ray machine, a rare luxury in college athletics, a state-of-the-art hydrotherapy room, zero-gravity treadmill, 12 training tables, and six additional taping stations.
The weight room, which measures 7,542 square feet, and Val LaMantia & Dr. Guy Bailey Academic Success Center, which measures 1,581 square feet, are used by football and various athletic programs. The VPC also features a nutrition center to keep UTRGV student-athletes fueled.
Robert & Janet Vackar Stadium
After acquiring the stadium in 2024, Conque and his team invested over $30 million in upgrades to the home of the football team, increasing capacity to 12,000, including 40 field level seats, 19 loge boxes, and 74 club seats, enhancing the three tailgating areas, including an amphitheater with a capacity of 2,000, upgrading the press box to handle ESPN broadcasts, and installing brand new video and ribbon boards and an artificial surface (FieldTurf).
UTRGV Fieldhouse
UTRGV celebrated the grand opening of the fieldhouse atrium on Oct. 15, 2025, capping off two years of major renovations. The latest enhancements include the Lew Hill Memorial Plaza and a new atrium that features ticket booths, a lobby, Hall of Fame and Hall of Honor area, team store, concessions, restrooms, and a new, unique way to watch games via the baseline club.
Conference Championships Run Through the Valley
After hosting on average at most one conference championship per year for its first nine years in the Western Athletic Conference, Conque expanded UTRGV’s commitment to bidding on and hosting championship-level events.
From 2022-24, UTRGV hosted four conference championships and one additional postseason event, including the 2023 and 2024 WAC Swimming & Diving Championships in Pharr, the 2022 WAC Volleyball Tournament and National Invitational Volleyball Championship in Edinburg, and the 2024 WAC Tennis Tournaments in Harlingen.
Furthering its commitment to hosting conference championships, UTRGV hosted Southland Conference Bracket Play at UTRGV Baseball Stadium in 2025 and is set to host the 2026 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Swimming & Diving Championships at the City of Pharr-PSJA Natatorium.
UTRGV is committed to hosting conference championships across the Valley, having now done so in five cities, including Brownsville, Edinburg, Harlingen, McAllen, and Pharr.
Competitive Success
UTRGV’s athletic programs have experienced significant competitive success during Conque’s first six seasons. Some of the recent highlights include the baseball team earning the UTRGV’s first team Southland Conference championship in 2025, track & field sending a program-record eight student-athletes to the 2025 NCAA West Preliminary Round, the volleyball team making back-to-back postseason appearances and winning the WAC in 2022, Desirea Buerge reaching the semifinals of the U.S. Track & Field Olympic Trials in the discus in 2021, men’s soccer earning top 25 rankings in both 2020-21 and 2019, and Abraham Chirchir advancing to the NCAA Cross Country Championships for the second-straight year in 2019.
#RISEup
All the above successes play into the mission statement that Conque unveiled on Sept. 16, 2021:
UTRGV Athletics will create a first-class student-athlete experience that fosters a culture of RESPECT, growth, and INTEGRITY, and supports our student-athletes in achieving SUCCESS in both the classroom and in competition.
We will be inclusive and #RallyTheValley as we inspire pride, create excitement, and ENGAGE our campus community and our region as the Rio Grande Valley’s Division I team.
Vaqueros United
The impact of UTRGV Athletics goes well beyond traditional metrics, though, as student-athletes took the initiative to launch Vaqueros United in the fall of 2020, a collaboration between UTRGV Athletics, the UTRGV Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, and the campus community to motivate the community in continuing meaningful conversations of peace, equality, social justice, and human rights through the utilization of our public platforms.
While Conque was an active participant in these conversations, one of the early leaders was men’s basketball coach, Lew Hill, and everyone was shocked and devastated when learning of his passing on February 7. In perhaps the most difficult role a Director of Athletics can have, Conque and the entire department were there for Hill’s family, including his wife and kids, and the team. Conque did everything he could to support everyone who was close to Coach Hill, including spearheading an effort to hold a memorial ceremony at the UTRGV Fieldhouse.
Varsity Club
Conque is passionate about reconnecting with former student-athletes, leading to the launch of the Varsity Club in July 2020. The Varsity Club is the official organization for all letter winners at UTRGV and its legacy institutions. The goal of the Varsity Club is to keep former student-athletes engaged with UTRGV Athletics following their collegiate careers, provide an opportunity for current student-athletes to have mentoring and networking opportunities with former student-athletes, and host letter winners on campus throughout the year.
Little Rock
Conque previously served as Vice Chancellor and Director of Athletics at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock from 2015-19, leading a resurgence of the athletic department. Little Rock won a combined 19 team and individual Sun Belt Conference Championships, highlighted by both the men’s and women’s basketball teams reaching the second round of the NCAA Tournament. Three Little Rock head coaches garnered Sun Belt Conference Coach of the Year honors and nearly four dozen Little Rock student-athletes were named to all-conference teams.
One of Little Rock’s top athletic highlights under Conque came in 2015-16, when the men’s basketball team finished the season 30-5 and advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament after an 85-83 double-overtime win over Purdue. The head coach of that team was Chris Beard, who Conque hired in April of 2015. Beard is now the head coach at Ole Miss and previously led Texas Tech to the national championship game in 2019.
Little Rock student-athletes posted a department-wide GPA above 3.0 during each of Conque’s last 13 semesters, including a 3.36 GPA in the fall of 2018, during which time 124 Little Rock student-athletes registered a GPA of 3.0 or higher, 38 of whom boasted a perfect 4.0.
In 2017-18, Little Rock set a program record for fundraising, bringing in $4.3 million to increase its total to more than $11 million over the previous three years.
Conque also added a wrestling program that competes as part of the Pac-12 in the spring of 2018.
Prior to becoming Director of Athletics at Little Rock, Conque spent four years at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS), serving as Senior Director of Development for the UAMS Medical Center from 2014-15 and Director of Development for the College of Medicine from 2011-14.
Conque began his professional career with Little Rock in July 2006 as the Manager of Donor Relations. He was promoted to Director of Development for Intercollegiate Athletics in Oct. 2007, a post he held for three and a half years.
Conque earned his MBA from Little Rock in 2008 and his Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance from Central Arkansas in 2006.
Conque and his wife, Lisa, have three daughters: twins Julianna and Sydney (13) and Adeline (11).
