Short Bio for Speaking Engagements
During his first seven 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 launching an FCS football program in 2025 with historic success, winning five team Southland Conference Championships in two years after moving UTRGV into the conference in 2024-25, nearly tripling attendance across all sports, generating over $47 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 nearly $200 million in facilities enhancements across 13 capital projects taking place from 2022-27 touching all 18 athletic programs at UTRGV, 12 of which are complete.
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 and a 2025-26 NACDA Athletic Director of the Year.
The Year of the Vaqueros: Competitive Excellence
At the start of the 2025-26 academic year, Conque declared that this would be the year of the Vaqueros. UTRGV went on to experience significant success across the board.
In competition, the Vaqueros won a department record four team Southland Conference Championships, including volleyball, women’s indoor track & field, and women’s and men’s golf, and the South Texas Showdown, presented by Rally Credit Union, Championship. From May 2025 through April 2026, UTRGV won five Southland Conference Championships including the 2025 baseball title. The basketball teams combined for a department record 41 wins, with the women winning a program record 21 games en route to the second round of the WNIT and the men winning 19 games, their most since 2018-19.
Many individual Vaqueros experienced historic success as well, with two student-athletes advancing to nationals, as Nayla Harris was a finalist in the 60-meter dash at the NCAA Indoor Championships, finishing fifth to earn All-American honors, while Jorge Martin Sampedro became UTRGV’s first men’s golfer to reach the NCAA Championships since 1978. Additionally, the UTRGV outdoor track & field teams sent a program-record 11 student-athletes to the NCAA West Preliminary Round.
UTRGV also won three Southland Conference Coach of the Year Awards, including Shareese Hicks (women’s indoor track & field), Todd Lowery (volleyball), and Houston Moore (men’s golf).
The Year of the Vaqueros: Inaugural Season of UTRGV Football
UTRGV made history in the Rio Grande Valley on August 30, 2025, as 12,726 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.
UTRGV had the winningest season of any inaugural FCS or DI-AA team ever, finishing 9-3 while receiving votes in the American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) FCS Coaches Poll in 10 out of 14 weeks. UTRGV’s only losses were to ranked teams on the road that made the FCS Playoffs. UTRGV went 7-0 at home, the first first-year FCS program to go undefeated at home.
Off the field, when construction, annual operations, and attendee spending are combined, the launch and inaugural season of the Vaqueros football program supported 1,028 jobs, generated $41.1 million in labor income, and added $58.7 million in value added (GDP), resulting in a total economic impact of $144.3 million in the local economy.
Additionally, excluding construction, the football program and associated game activity supports 187 jobs, generates $5.9 million in labor income, and adds $8.4 million in GDP, resulting in $17.7 million in recurring annual economic impact for the City of Edinburg.
The Year of the Vaqueros: #RallyTheValley
UTRGV ranked 10th in NCAA Division I with 5,385 hours of community service across 2,950 commitments. Seven programs ranked among the top in their sport in community service, with both track & field/cross country teams ranking second, baseball ranking fourth, swimming & diving ranking fifth, volleyball ranking sixth, men’s tennis ranking ninth, and men’s soccer ranking 10th.
The Valley responded by rallying behind the Vaqueros in a significant way, with a department record 228,069 fans attending home contests across all sports, an increase of over 500% over the last seven years.
UTRGV ranked 11th in the FCS in total football attendance (87,774), 15th in average attendance (12,539), and sixth in percentage of capacity (104.49%) while selling out all seven home games.
While UTRGV was in the thick of its inaugural football season, the volleyball team, which twice had home matches on a home football game day, set a program attendance record by drawing 13,391 fans. The baseball team welcomed 74,465 fans across 20 home dates, the 36th-best mark in the NCAA and second-highest total in program history while shattering the program record for average attendance at 3,723 fans per game, the 23rd best in the NCAA.
UTRGV ended 2025-26 with nearly 11,000 season ticket holders across the ticketed sports of baseball, men’s and women’s basketball, football, and volleyball, plus a football season ticket waiting list of more than 12,000 tickets.
The #RallyTheValley mantra dates back to Conque’s introductory press conference in Aug. 2019, when stated his intention to “Rally the Valley” behind UTRGV Athletics.
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 annual competitions in Brownsville and Harlingen, including the 2024 WAC Tennis Tournaments, while most teams host youth clinics in Brownsville and Harlingen every year.
The Year of the Vaqueros: Academic Excellence
In the classroom, the Vaqueros raised their cumulative grade point average to 3.37, the highest it has been since the spring of 2020, including a 3.34 GPA in the spring, the department’s best single-semester GPA since the spring of 2023.
For the 2025-26 academic year, UTRGV student-athletes combined to post a 3.31 GPA.
The impressive GPAs build on an academic year that saw UTRGV finish with a 986 Academic Progress Rate (APR), its third year in a row above 985. Nine programs achieved perfect APRs of 1,000, including volleyball and men’s and women’s cross country, golf, tennis, and soccer.
The commitment to student success extends beyond 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.
Additionally, UTRGV Athletics employed over 200 student workers in 2025-26.
The Year of the Vaqueros: Facilities
Robert & Janet Vackar Stadium
The stadium in which UTRGV football excelled was acquired in March 2024 with the assistance of the City of Edinburg. Conque and his team invested over $30 million in upgrades to Robert & Janet Vackar Stadium, 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).
Ahead of the 2026 season, UTRGV is expanding the south end zone by approximately 1,500 seats, increasing student seating from 3,000 to 3,250 and the overall capacity from 12,000 to 13,498.
Vaqueros Performance Center
In August 2025, UTRGV Athletics opened 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.
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.
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 2025-26, UTRGV Athletics generated nearly $9 million with a department record over $2 million in corporate sponsorship revenue, a department record nearly $1.4 million in ticket sales, and over $5 million in philanthropic giving.
Conque and his family believe strongly in giving back to UTRGV Athletics, as they are among the original members of the Football Founders Society and endowed the first marching band scholarship in UTRGV history.
Licensing
The UTRGV Vaqueros can be found in stores, banks and restaurants across the Valley, as UTRGV Athletics partnered with a local brewery 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 was one of just 28 college football teams in the nation to have a branded Bud Light can during the 2025 season.
Altogether, the sales of licensed merchandise and products have increased from $650,000 seven years ago to $2.1 million in 2025-26.
Conference Championships Run Through the Valley
From 2022-26, UTRGV hosted six conference championships and one additional postseason event, including the 2023 and 2024 WAC Swimming & Diving Championships and 2026 MPSF Swimming & Diving Championships in Pharr, the 2022 WAC Volleyball Tournament and National Invitational Volleyball Championship in Edinburg, the 2024 WAC Tennis Tournaments in Harlingen, and 2025 Southland Conference Baseball Bracket Play in Edinburg.
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 seven seasons. Some of the highlights prior to 2025-26 include the baseball team earning UTRGV’s first team Southland Conference championship in 2025, 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.
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 (14) and Adeline (12).
