With the calendar turning to 2025, the UTRGV Men’s Basketball team has found itself in the middle of a turnaround, bringing a new playstyle and winning ways to Vaqueros fans.
As of press time, the Vaqueros are currently 11-6 overall, and 3-3 (6th) in the Southland Conference, nearly doubling its win total from the entirety of the 2023-24, a dismal 6-25 campaign that saw them finish last in the Western Athletic Conference (2-18).
The Vaqueros parted ways with then head coach Matt Figger, hiring former BYU assistant Kahill Fennell, and announced a move from the WAC to the Southland Conference.
In an interview with The Rider, Fennell said that the key for the Vaqueros, is to continue to improve as the team goes through “the ups and downs” of the season.
“I think by and large, we continue to improve and get better,” Fennell said. “That really is the key and the focus for the rest of the year is to continue to progress and be a better version of ourselves every time we step on the floor.”
Fifth-year guard K.T. Raimey, who’s averaging 12.1 points and 21 minutes per game this season, said that the Vaqueros have exceeded their preseason expectations.
“Coming off of how everybody rated us in the preseason, I feel like we lived up to a higher expectation than what everyone looked at us as,” Raimey said.
Senior guard Hasan Abdul Hakim, who played for the Vaqueros last season, said that the biggest changes between last season and this season has been both in culture and in playstyle.
“The culture [has changed],” Hakim said. “Everybody understand[s] their roles, and obviously [we’re] in a position that we weren’t in last year with a [new] kind of playstyle.”
This season, Hakim is averaging just under 7 rebounds a game, said that remaining physical is what helps him get his team those second opportunities.
The underlying statistics behind the Vaqueros’ offensive success this season tell a story of, according to Raimey, a team that shoots “so many threes that we live by the three and die by the three.”
This season, the Vaqueros lead the Southland Conference in three pointers attempted (35.1 3PA) and made (11.6 3PM) per game.
This aggressive approach behind the arc has yielded results, as the Vaqueros rank second in the conference in points per game (79.9) and third in point differential (+9.1). All statistics are current as of press time.
UTRGV has also led the conference in assists per game (18.3). Junior point guard Trey Miller, who leads the team in assists (68), said as the Vaqueros enter a stretch of conference matchups, they must control what they can.
“[We have to] control all the controllables, and do everything we need to do to win,” Miller said.
As the season progresses, Fennell said that discipline is the area where the team has the biggest room for improvement.
“Whether it’s shot selection, fouling three-point shooters or some of our disciplinary issues as far as techs or getting into it with people,” he said. “… Our general discipline has to continue to improve and that’s gonna be a big fight for us moving forward.”.≥
On shot selection, Raimey said that although the team attempts many three point shots, they also need to find more buckets in the paint and from mid-range.
“We’re gonna get [three point shots] up but at the same time we wanna take good ones,” he said. “We want to get good shots and find ways to get twos in the game too.”
The Vaqueros are currently playing out the conference portion of their schedule and will play their next game at 4:30 p.m. Saturday at home against the McNeese State Cowboys.
