Jasmin Espinosa BROWNSVILLE – UTRGV athletics announced the hiring of Brandon Chambers as the new head coach for men’s basketball.
In a news conference on Monday Chambers said his decision to join the UTRGV Vaqueros was a matter of “fit and feel.”
“I think, you know, like there’s some other schools in the league that, that opened up. And for me, it’s all about the people,” Chambers said. “Obviously the alignment was there. There’s been alignment in other places as well. But, if, if I don’t feel like it’s right, then, then it’s not right for me.”
Chambers made nine-straight NCAA tournaments as an assistant coach at North Carolina State University, McNeese and Texas Southern to name a few.
He said as of now he is a one-man army and he hopes within the next couple of weeks he can hire staff and look into players in the transfer portal to join the Vaqueros.
“The next four to six weeks will determine whether or not we cut down nets, in 12 months,” Chambers said. “And, and so the sacrifices we make now will pay huge dividends down the road and obviously, the big one is, is in recruiting, you know, you know, coach, hopefully you say about role shifting, you know becoming a new head coach here.” New Associate head coach comes to Women’s Soccer From a new hiring to a promotion, Melanie Chandler will be the new associate head coach for women’s soccer.
Chandler was hired as an assistant coach in April 2023 and has been a “stabilizing force” within the program. Often preserving and strengthening the program’s culture by empowering student-athletes to be the best version of themselves.
Meet UTRGV’s newest quarterback
Garret Rangel, redshirt junior quarterback, is just one of the many UTRGV football additions to sign with the vaqueros earlier this year, in February.
“I’m very excited. This is like a brotherhood,” Rangel said. “Coach Bush has done a great job establishing a culture here. I’m just very. I feel very special and blessed to be part of this, this group and this team and, it’s just it’s just great the way everyone loves each other. And compete with each other.”
Rangel grew up in Frisco, Texas and graduated from Lone Star High School where he played for three consecutive years at Oklahoma State starting in 2022 before moving to Virginia Tech in 2025.
He explained his day-to-day routine.
“So, I wake up, I don’t know about 8:30 a.m. maybe, make breakfast a little bit, study some of the plays that we have in that day,” he said. “Sometimes I will meet with the coaches to go over some stuff and, so then around then around noon and probably get some lunch.”
A cultural part of his routine is his band warm-ups.
“I get a band, I just kind of, like, do some stretch, pull up stuff like that, or, lap pool pull a parts something like that, and, well, get a band to hold it and it’s kind of like just kind of external stuff too, so I can warm up the area. I warm up the muscles and stuff and, most of the time I really got one on my back,” he said.
Aside from football, Rangel enjoys watching movies, watching tv shows and playing ping-pong with his mom.
“When I go home, my mom’s playing ping pong all the time, and she gets mad when I beat her now because she can’t beat me anymore,” Rangel said. “But, yeah, I would probably say ping pong, watching movies or grilling, I like to grill a lot or just relaxing in my down time.”
Rangel said although he has big shoes to fill, he is readying himself for the challenge.
“Yeah, I mean, Eddie had a great season last year, broke a lot of records, a great things,” Rangel said. “Yeah, for me, I’m just I’m just going to like I said, take it one day at a time and just try to be the best I can be.”
Rangel will be in action later this fall when UTRGV football returns on Aug. 29, against UT Permian Basin.
The Vaqueros aim for the top
Despite numerous challenges, player injuries and team setbacks. The Vaqueros remain determined and have their sights set on winning conference.
“Our goals are getting [conference] to get in the [conference]. you got to make your tournament and when you make the tournament you got to win your tournament.”
As of Sunday, the vaqueros held a 5.16 earned run average among all pitchers.
Head coach Derek Matlock said one of his goals is to improve the pitchers’ performance on the mound.
“Pitching has got to get better and they’re in here. they’re here,” Matlock said. “Who’s going to step up and do it.” … “We gotta have some guy’s pitch better than they’ve ever pitched not above their ability, but just to their ability not ask asking to do any more than they can.”
UTRGV is fifth in the Southland Conference with a 9-9 record. The overall record for the Vaqueros is 14 to 18.
Matlock said the team faced a lot of obstacles last year, but he hopes a healthy roster will help the Vaqueros succeed in conference play.
“Injuries happen to everybody right now,” he said. “We’re all going through it. we’re all in the grind of it.” “We got to get locked into everything on the weekends and try to run ourselves up in the top of this conference, get a good seed, maybe even build to play at home in the tournament and, have all these pitchers healthy, which is what we didn’t have last year.”
The Vaqueros will take on the Houston Christian University huskies Monday at home.
Men’s Tennis readies to server up SCL
Onto the court, men’s tennis is getting ready to serve up some action in its upcoming southland conference play.
With the Vaqueros experiencing a rough season, Nathan Robinson, Men’s Tennis head coach, said the team’s performance has been a little below average.
“They’ve competed very, very well,” Robinson said. “We’ve been in a lot of matches, very, very tight matches, haven’t finished the job as much as we’d like to but, you know, overall, a very competitive year for us. We just got to finish a little bit better down the end.”
Robinson said the Vaqueros have not lost momentum throughout the season, and the team continues to stay confident in its matches.
“Some guys have gone through some, you know, losing streak here or there but they haven’t really lost the confidence and knowing if they show up and do things right, there’s very few teams that that can hang with them,” Robinson said.
Loic Young, sophomore tennis player, said reflecting on the matches with his team helps them prepare to win.
“Mentally we attempt to be all together, sometimes we get together and we talk a little bit about the match, and we try to mentally prepare to win as in the end it does not matter.”
Young said the matches are not easy however, motivation and support from each of his teammates help him perform better.
“What motivates me is obviously to win conference and being with all of my teammates supporting one another, it’s the best, and I like being over here and I hope we do well in the tournament,” Young said. “It has shown me that no match is easy; it could be first or second division or whatever. No match is easy and we must face every match like if it was the best day more than anything.”
With only two games left before entering the southland conference, the Vaqueros will face off the Nicholls State University Colonels Monday at home.
