Women's Volleyball

The year just ending has been one for the college sports record books and many kudos are due to the Bobcat athletes and their coaches.

UC Merced men’s and women’s outdoor track swept the California Pacific (Cal Pac) Conference Championships in their inaugural seasons. Women’s soccer beat 14^th-ranked Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in the Cal Pac Tournament Championship game and got to hoist their first trophy in front of Bobcat Nation on Bobcat Field.

UC Merced is highlighting incoming students for fall 2023 — a dynamic, diverse and accomplished cohort of new Bobcats.

When Clovis native and lifelong volleyball player Morgan Wilson first began exploring her options to play at the collegiate level, her path was not clear. She had several out-of-state opportunities, none of which felt like the right fit.

"I didn't even feel a spark with a lot of the schools," she said.

Then she visited UC Merced.

It’s an incredible time to be a Bobcat student-athlete.

In a year turned inside-out by COVID-19, UC Merced’s intercollegiate teams have risen above with atmospheric levels of success.

With all sports seasons shifted to spring because of the global pandemic, UC Merced squads burst out of the gate and racked up one success after another.

It is often said in sports that you have to struggle and overcome adversity before being able to bask in the glory of success.

UC Merced athletics has faced adversity since first transitioning from a recreation program to a NAIA member eight years ago.

But the wait for success was, well, not long at all.

Last fall, Turlock native Marcus DeCouto reminded the sports scene that UC Merced consistently brings some of the top freshmen to the California Pacific Conference.

DeCouto, now a sophomore midfielder on the Bobcats’ men’s soccer team, became the first Cal Pac player since 2015 to record at least 10 goals and 10 assists in a single season. To little surprise, he was named the conference’s Freshman of the Year.

UC Merced’s Athletics Department has hired women's volleyball coach and alumnus Surabordin "Ai" Prachumsri as the men's volleyball head coach.

Some of UC Merced’s most celebrated sports stars of the recent past are now helping to lead the newest generation of student-athletes at their alma mater.

Surabordin "Ai" Prachumsri has been hired to take the helm as UC Merced’s second head coach in women's volleyball and the first alumnus to become a head coach for the campus.

Long hours and hard work paid off for UC Merced’s intercollegiate athletics program last week when the California Pacific Conference’s 2014-15 awards were announced. For the first time in conference history, one school earned every departmental award.

UC Merced Director of Recreation and Athletics David Dunham was selected as the Cal Pac Athletic Director of the Year. UC Merced was also named the top institution in the categories of sportsmanship, sports medicine and sports information.