SAN ANTONIO — UTSA head volleyball coach Laura Neugebauer-Groff announced Wednesday the additions of Pete Hoyer and Dominique Gonzalez to her coaching staff for the upcoming 2017 season.
Hoyer will take on the role as associate head coach, while Gonzalez joins the staff as an assistant coach.
"I feel very fortunate to add my long-time friend, Pete, to my coaching staff," Neugebauer-Groff said. "He brings a wealth of experience and expertise to our program. Pete has been a head coach and an associate head coach at his previous stops, so he knows what it takes to get to the postseason. His coaching style is energetic and adds to the work ethic we already have in place toward reaching our goal of making the NCAAs every year."
The newly-named associate head coach heads back to the Lone Star State following stops at North Carolina State, Dayton and Ohio. Before his return, he served a year as head coach of the Triangle Volleyball Club 18 Blue Team where he was involved in all aspects of the organization.
"I'd like to thank Laura for providing me this opportunity to join her staff here at UTSA," Hoyer said. "The university is in a beautiful city and part of the country, so I'm excited to get on the ground running in our recruiting efforts for seasons to come. Joining forces with Laura this year has been a long time coming. We played in coed tournaments in the 80s after she was done playing at Texas and I was working on my masters, so it will be great to see how we collaborate as coaches toward a common goal."
In has last collegiate coaching stint, Hoyer was an assistant coach at North Carolina State for six seasons from 2010-15 where he helped guide the Wolfpack to a 108-83 record. Hoyer served as the recruiting coordinator and worked with the middle blockers where he mentored then-freshman Blayke Hranicka the team's leading scorer with 409.5 points, the most by a freshman in Wolfpack program history.
During his time in Raleigh, he helped guide N.C. State to six consecutive 16-plus win seasons, including three of 20-plus wins (2011-13). In 2012, NC State posted a 22-10 overall record, including a 12-8 mark in the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), the most league wins in school history. That same season, the Wolfpack posted its highest finish in the ACC, checking in at No. 4, and punched a ticket to the NCAA Tournament, which was its first postseason appearance since the 1987 campaign.
Hoyer took a seven-year hiatus from coaching at the collegiate level and spent that time as a high school special education teacher and coach from 2003-05.
His most successful stop was his nine seasons as the head coach at Dayton from 1994-2002, where he was named Atlantic 10 Coach of the Year in 2001 after leading the Flyers to a 21-6 overall record and 14-2 league mark. Hoyer amassed a 178-96 overall record and his storied career with the Flyers included a pair of A-10 regular season titles (1998, 2001) and numerous superlative conference awards.
Gonzalez, a native of San Antonio, makes her return after a one-year stint at Kent State where she helped the Golden Flashes become one of the top defensive teams in the Mid-American Conference (MAC), primarily working with back row defenders and passers.
"I feel blessed to be able to add Dominique to our coaching staff," Neugebauer-Groff said. "Being from San Antonio, I've known her family and seen her grow as a person and an athlete since she was eight years old. Her playing background speaks for itself. She knows what it takes to win championships and I'm excited about the energy she will bring to the gym."
The two-time National Champion helped Kent State register the third-most digs in program history in her one season with the Golden Flashes in 2016. She helped Kent State average 16.67 digs per set, which was best for 35th in the nation and third in the MAC.
"I'm extremely excited for the opportunity to be back in San Antonio, coaching for a great program in UTSA Athletics, and to be working with such a knowledgeable staff and hard-working group of young women," Gonzalez said. "I'm thankful to Lynn Hickey and Laura for allowing me to have the opportunity to join the Roadrunner family. I'm looking forward to seeing the kind of positive impact we as a coaching staff can have on these young women in the program and within the San Antonio volleyball community."
The San Antonio native also helped mentor a pair of first team All-MAC selections in libero Challen Geraghty and outside hitter Kelsey Bittinger. Geraghty ranked fourth in the nation in digs (669) and digs per set (5.53) and posted the second-most digs in a season in program history. Bittinger tallied 3.19 digs per frame to top all non-defensive specialists in the league.
Before her coaching career began, Gonzalez was a three-time team captain for the two-time National Champion Penn State from 2011-14. The Nittany Lions made four appearances at the NCAA Tournament, including three Final Fours, and captured back-to-back Big Ten titles in 2012-13.
