EDINBURG, Texas – The Rio Grande Valley (RGV), a sprawling four-county region along the U.S.-Mexico border best known for citrus production, is just like any other in Texas. The residents are crazy about their football.
There’s plenty of pigskin to go around for the more than 1.3 million residents who call the RGV home. The Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans? That’s a given.
The Valley’s 40-plus UIL high school football programs have always been a big draw on Thursday and Friday nights. The Longhorns and Aggies have their factions of fans, many of whom have had their fandoms passed down from one generation to the next.
The looming question, beginning this fall: Is there enough of an appetite for the Valley’s own, homegrown college football team?
It is Travis Bush’s job to find the answer. Bush is the first-ever head football coach of the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) Vaqueros in Edinburg.
“I think so,” Bush, 49, told KSAT. “That’s the beauty of it: an opportunity to bring the entire Valley together, and they love football. Nothing brings people together more in the world than sports. Having that football team here — I think you’ve already seen that with the support, with the ticket sales — but I think it’ll continue to bring people together. And it’s not just about football, but it’s about the event. I’m excited to watch as we go into this year and kind of how it progresses in the future.”
Back to school
Bush is tasked with steering the ship of a program that is days away from hitting open ocean for the first time.
After nearly three full years of recruiting, hiring staff, fundraising, upgrading and building up athletic facilities, Bush and the Vaqueros will take the field Saturday at Robert and Janet Vackar Stadium as the NCAA’s newest Division I football program.
“The (Rio Grande) Valley is so special,” Bush, who left New Braunfels Canyon after a 9-2 season for Edinburg in 2022, said. “The love for football, the passion for football. And then, to see the plan that was in place — knowing that it was going to be done right. An opportunity to come learn and grow from (UTRGV Athletic Director) Chasse Conque and (UTRGV President) Dr. (Guy) Bailey. Those were two guys, as I got to know them, were definitely two guys I wanted to work with and be a part of.”
Before he left New Braunfels, Bush said he had to make sure the move down south was OK with his son, Ty, who was then a high school sophomore football player at Canyon.
“My son still had two years (left) in high school and that was the plan: to coach him,” Bush said. “He was actually involved. … If he (Ty) would have said he wanted me to stay and coach him (at Canyon), I would have. That was a no-brainer.”
Ty Bush is now a freshman punter at UTRGV.
“He was the one who gave me the blessing to stay in the mix and go after it,” Bush said. “Now, we have the opportunity to be together again, as he’s back on our team now.”
Though he has been a high school head coach in Seguin and New Braunfels, Bush has served in various assistant roles at college stops under legendary coach Gary Patterson at Texas Christian University, the University of Houston, Texas State University and the University of Texas at San Antonio.
According to Bush, high school coaching and college coaching have their differences but are fundamentally the same job.
“Coaching’s coaching. That piece isn’t any different,” Bush said. “In fact, we’re running the program the same way and really focusing on, you know, building that culture and the foundation and building men. Now, obviously with the recruiting and the level of things we’re doing, (that) is different. Actually, being a head coach in high school and an athletic director, has been beneficial (to) give me experience for this job.”
‘What a day’
Whether intentionally or by happenstance, Bush and his father, Bruce, were born to be on a football field.
Bruce Bush, 77, began his football coaching career in 1970 at Sweeny High School, approximately 60 miles southwest of downtown Houston.
After his time in Sweeny, Bruce Bush’s career took him to Port Neches-Groves High School, located southeast of Beaumont.
Bruce Bush’s tenure as a Port Neches-Groves assistant coach in the 1970s became some of the most formative years of his adult life.
In 1975, PN-G went on a historic run through the Class 4A playoffs, defeating the former Beaumont French High School, South Houston High School and Houston Kashmere High School.
The win against Houston Kashmere catapulted the program to a state semifinal matchup against San Antonio Lee, now LEE High School, at the Houston Astrodome. PN-G ran away from Lee in a 28-0 win, clinching a berth in the Class 4A state title game against the Odessa Permian Panthers.
On Dec. 20, 1975, PN-G forced five Panther turnovers, including a first-quarter fumble return for a touchdown, and won the Class 4A state championship, 20-10, at the famed hole-in-the-roof adorned Texas Stadium in Irving.
For Bruce Bush, the fun had only just begun.
“What a day,” he told KSAT. “We made the long trip back from the old (Dallas) Cowboys stadium. The kids, of course, they took them around town on the fire trucks. When I got home at about 3 o’clock in the morning (on Dec. 21), my wife was in labor. She was too pregnant to go to the ball game. So, immediately, we drive to Beaumont, and my only son (Travis) is born at 6 o’clock the next morning.”
According to Bruce Bush, people called Travis “Champ” for several years after he was born the morning after PN-G’s state title win.
“You know how old Travis is going to be this Dec. 21st,” Bruce said. “It was quite a day and quite a memory to have.”
Bruce’s bona fides
Bruce Bush, himself, became Texas high school football royalty. After leaving PN-G, he became a head coach and never looked back.
His career took him to the RGV for the first time when he took the head football coaching role at Pharr-San Juan-Alamo (PSJA) High School in 1981. His stay in the Valley was just two seasons long before he spent a combined 13 seasons between Alice High School and Gregory-Portland High School — capturing a combined 11 playoff appearances, six district titles and two trips to the state semifinal round with Gregory-Portland.
Bruce Bush returned to the Valley for two years at Donna High School and then went up to San Marcos High School from 1997 to 2005.
Two brief retirements later, Bruce Bush returned to South Texas for good. In 2008, he became PSJA North High School’s head coach and put together three more playoff teams in five seasons.
“One thing you may not know is my wife (Ida) is from Mercedes, Texas,” he said. “You can take the girl out of the Valley, but you can’t take the Valley out of the girl. … PSJA was very good to me. The Valley has been good to me the entire, I guess, 30 years I’ve been down here.”
By the time his high school head coaching career wrapped up, he won 69% of his games, coached 24 of 34 teams to postseason play and was named to three lifetime honorary athletic inductions — the Coastal Bend Coaches Association Hall of Honor, the Rio Grande Valley Sports Hall of Fame and the Texas High School Coaches Association’s Hall of Honor.
Together again
Bruce Bush appeared to be done with football. He was enjoying his third attempt at retirement, considering this try lasted much longer than the two previous retirements combined.
When Travis Bush earned the job at UTRGV and began assembling a football administrative staff, he found a role he thought would best suit his father: director of high school relations.
Bruce Bush accepted the role in 2024.
“We’ve been in this business, and they’ve lived down here for 20 years. So, we never saw each other much,” Travis Bush said. “An opportunity to be around each other, and for him, to get back around the game. That’s the piece he missed the most, just the camaraderie with the team and the coaches.”
“It’s a position. It’s not really a job,” Bruce Bush said jokingly. “It gives me the opportunity to be out here and be around these kids. You know, my tail’s wagging every morning when I get up. I’m in a three-point stance to come out here and just be around these kids and be a part of their journey and watch the building of this program. Certainly, this is history in the making. Why would anybody pass up the opportunity to come out here and be a part of history?”
His strong ties within the Texas high school football coaching fraternity will also come in handy for UTRGV football recruiting purposes.
“I was a high school coach for many, many years. I know all the coaches, and they know me,” he said. “We invite them to the meetings. As soon as our (Vaqueros) Performance Center is finished, we’ll end up providing a spring clinic for the high school coaches. My role, I think, will grow, as I learn more about what to do. But I’m just happy to be here, and I really feel blessed.”
Travis Bush said his father’s more than four decades in coaching will be an asset for the younger coaches on his staff.
“He’s been a phenomenal coach, especially with details and management and working with kids and working with people,” Travis Bush said. “He’s a value asset for us, too. It’s been fun to see him every day and have him around. I always joke (that) he gave me my first job out of college. It’s only fitting that I give him his last.”
The Vaqueros will kick off their season and program, for real, at home at 7 p.m. Saturday against Sul Ross State, an NCAA Division II opponent, in Edinburg.