Roadrunners kick off the season against two Big 12 opponents
UTSA’s 2025 women’s soccer season officially gets underway tonight.
The Roadrunners take on Houston at 7 p.m. at UTSA Park West Athletics Complex.
UTSA warmed up for the opener with two exhibition matches.
The Roadrunners put on a show for the home fans with a 6-0 preseason victory over A&M-Corpus Christi at Park West.
“It really gave us an opportunity against Corpus to work on our defensive pressing, how we want to disrupt teams,” UTSA coach Derek Pittman said in Monday’s news conference on ESPN+. “It also gave us an opportunity to attack a lot. We were fortunate enough to score several goals in that game from a number of different people, which was really positive.”
The Roadrunners got goals three goals from Brooklyn Bailey and one each from Jasmine Kessler, Michelle Polo and Ava Jackson.
UTSA’s second preseason game was a 2-0 loss to 19th-ranked Texas.
“Going against Texas, we know they’re always going to be a talented squad,” Pittman said. “They’re ranked in the top 20 in the preseason polls. They won the SEC championship last year. They lost several players, key contributors for their team, but they’re still a very talented group and we knew it was going to be a different kind of test.
“We wanted to play Texas because we knew these are the types of games that we had coming up in the opening weekend. Texas was going to prepare us for what we’re going to see against Houston. Texas was going to prepare us for what we’re going to see vs. TCU.”
Houston, a member of the Big 12 Conference, beat UTSA 2-1 last season in Houston. Bri Carrigan scored UTSA’s only goal in the loss.
The Cougars are under new head coach Ben Williams. Last season he was the head coach at Stephen F. Austin, which won 14 games and reached the NCAA Tournament. Houston is led by senior Cameryn Maddox, who recorded two goals last season.
UTSA plays at home again Sunday at 7:30 p.m. against ninth-ranked TCU. The Frogs also open the season tonight, taking on Pepperdine in Fort Worth.
TCU is the defending Big 12 regular-season champion and is picked to win the conference again this season.
“It’s exactly what we want for our fans,” Pittman said. “We talk to our players all the time… we want to play the best. We want to put ourselves in these kinds of environments and play these types of teams that are going to test us and really show what we’re made of. I know our players are excited and ready for that.
“Come out and watch us at Park West and you get a chance to see us compete against two very, very strong Big 12 teams in Houston and obviously TCU being ranked in the top 10. It’s going to be a lot of fun to watch and I’m excited to see our players compete in these environments.”