Jennifer Montoya is entering her 13th season as the head coach of the University of the Incarnate Word volleyball program. She has recorded double-digit victory totals in nine of her 12 years and has reached 20 wins on two occasions. She enters the 2015 season with a 171-209 career record.
Montoya is no stranger to Division I. She played four years of volleyball at the University of Florida and knows what it takes to win at the highest level. In the program’s first year at the Division I level, the Cardinals went 13-13 overall and 7-7 in the Southland. The team played an exciting brand of volleyball and pulled off some memorable wins in 2013, including a 5-set victory over Texas Tech in front of a program record crowd of 1,262.
In 2014, the Cardinals had a slow start to the season, but picked up a quality 5-set win over Texas State during the pre-conference schedule. The squad showed resilience by winning four five-set matches during conference play. For the second straight season, Angelique Vidaurri was the lone player on the squad to earn all-Southland Conference honors.
Montoya came to UIW in the summer of 2003 and experienced one .500 campaign in her first four. Then it got good beginning with a Heartland Conference title in 2007 followed by a runner-up position in 2008 and a 2009 trip to the tournament semi-finals. Then came the transition to the Lone Star Conference.
The first year of play (2010) in the LSC proved to be a bit tough as the Cardinals dropped below the .500 mark for the first time in four years. However, UIW won its final match on the schedule to secure the eighth and final spot in the championship tournament. Along the way, UIW won over Southeastern Oklahoma on October 9 giving Montoya her 125th win at UIW to break the school record of 124. The three seasons in the Lone Star proved to be difficult as the Cardinals were unable to crack .500 in any season, but they did make two appearances in the LSC Tournament.
Jennifer Montoya always played for winning teams where she has garnered top individual awards and that continued into her coaching career after being voted the Heartland’s Coach of the Year following the 2005 and 2007 seasons. In 2005, she improved the team's record by 8.5 games and went 9-3 in Heartland Conference play. Similarly, in 2007, her squad had a massive 14-game improvement while notching 23 victories. From 2007 through 2009, she accumulated a 66-34 record and won at least 19 matches in each season.
Montoya’s players have garnered numerous awards since she started in 2003. Kim Kvapil still remains the only All-American in the program’s history when she earned Daktronics Second Team and AVCA Honorable Mention honors in 2008. That same year, Kvapil was named the Daktronics South Central Region Player of the Year and earned first team all-region honors from both the AVCA and Daktronics.
Montoya coached the Heartland Conference Player of the Year in three consecutive seasons with Kvapil winning in 2007 and 2008 and Edie Weise taking the honors in 2009. Weise was also a Daktronics Second Team all-region and AVCA Honorable Mention all-region choice in 2009.
Montoya has tutored six players who earned CoSIDA Capital One Academic All-District honors and had players earn four Lone Star Conference All-Academic Team awards. Overall, her players have aquired 21 all-Heartland, eight all-LSC and two all-Southland Conference honors.
Immediately before UIW, she played professionally in Maia, Portugal. Her team, Castelo da Maia Ginasio Clube, won the Portuguese League Championship and the Portuguese Cup.
Those successes were an extension of what she accomplished at the University of Florida where she was a 1998 All-American player. Her teams reached the NCAA Final Four three times and the Gators were in the Elite Eight on time. Montoya led Florida to four Southeastern Conference titles and three SEC tournament championships.
Her list of individual accomplishments at Florida is extensive. Twice she was AVCA all-district, she was All-SEC twice, and three times All-SEC academic. In 1999 alone, she was on five different all-tournament teams. She received the Arthur Ashe Scholar-Athlete Award and the Multicultural Recognition Award.
Her high school training came right here in San Antonio. She is a graduate of Providence High School where in 1996 she was the Gatorade Southwest Regional Player of the Year and was the San Antonio EXPRESS-NEWS Player of the Year. In addition to being the school’s athlete of the year, she was the scholar-athlete of the year.
Montoya is a 2002 graduate of University of Florida, where she earned her bachelor’s degree in graphic design. She and her husband, Adrian are the proud parents of Maia Lynn and Derek. They reside in San Antonio.
