UTRGV announced the 2023 volleyball schedule Thursday, featuring 10 home matches and 29 total contests.
“I think it’s a really challenging schedule,” UTRGV head coach Todd Lowery said. “The non-conference schedule is going to be a good balance of really high-quality matches and a few chances for us to get some wins as well, and prepare for the WAC schedule. The road matches will test us early. We know whoever can win on the road during the WAC season will put themselves in position to win the championship.”
The Vaqueros will play their first six matches and 11 of their 13 non-conference contests on the road. They open the season Aug. 25-27 in Missoula, Montana, and will play Montana, BYU and Pitt as part of the Ellesyn Invitational. UTRGV faces off with Penn, Houston Christian and Prairie View A&M on Sept. 1-2 in Houston as part of the Molly Howard Gerwig Memorial Tournament.
“Pitt is coming off a Final Four appearance. BYU is a perennial top 25 team and a physical, big team. It doesn’t get much higher quality than that right out of the gate,” Lowery said. “It’s a good thing for us. We have a new look to our roster, a lot of new faces, so I think that first weekend will be good to find out what we’re made of.”
The home opener is slated for 6:30 p.m. on Sept. 5 at the UTRGV Fieldhouse against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi as part of the South Texas Showdown. The Vaqueros and Islanders will face off again Sept. 9 in Corpus in the Islanders Classic.
The Vaqueros will be back on the road for the next five matches. They’ll play CSUN, San Francisco and San Jose State on Sept. 15-16 as part of the USF Challenge in San Francisco.
UTRGV, the reigning Western Athletic Conference regular season champion, opens the 2023 WAC campaign at UT Arlington and at Stephen F. Austin on Sept. 21-23. The Vaqueros will host Southern Utah and Utah Tech in the first conference home matches Sept. 28-30. They’ll be back on the road to play at Seattle U and Utah Valley Oct. 5-7 before returning to the UTRGV Fieldhouse Oct. 12-14 for conference matches against Grand Canyon and California Baptist. They’ll play at Abilene Christian and Tarleton Oct. 19-21.
The conference schedule turns over during the final week of October, switching home and away for three pairs of contests. UTRGV hosts Stephen F. Austin and UT Arlington Oct. 26-28, then heads on the final road trip of the regular season to face Utah Tech and Southern Utah Nov. 2-4.
The Vaqueros will cap the regular season with a pair of WAC matches against Tarleton and Abilene Christian on Nov. 9-11 at the UTRGV Fieldhouse.
The top eight teams in the regular season conference standings will advance to the 2023 WAC Tournament, scheduled for Nov. 16-18 in Orem, Utah. The tournament champion earns an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, which will begin the first weekend of December. The NCAA championship semifinals will be played Dec. 14 and the championship match is slated for 2 p.m. on Dec. 17 in Tampa, Florida. For the first time, the Final Four matches will be broadcast live on ABC.