A new era for the Sam Houston women’s soccer program is underway.

After months of searching for a new head coach, the Bearkats announced Friday that Kendall Ayers will be taking over the program. 

Ayers, who becomes the fourth head coach in program history, spent the last season at Texas Southern University. She replaces Sonia Curvelo, who took a position at San José State in March. 

In her only season with TSU, Ayers led the Tigers to their first-ever Southwestern Athletic Conference regular-season championship, as well as a SWAC championship game appearance. She was named the SWAC Coach of the Year and helped develop the offensive and defensive players of the year.

The Tigers went 9-9-2 overall and 6-1-1 during conference play. To get to the conference final, TSU had to beat Prairie View and Alabama A&M. They ended up falling short to Southern 1-0 in the title game. 

Before working at TSU, Ayers spent two seasons as head coach at Louisiana Christian University. She led the team to an 18-10-4 record and was the all-time winningest head coach in school history. She helped lead the Wildcats to the postseason in both seasons. During her time at LCU, she had three student athletes receive All-Red River Athletic Conference accolades.

Ayers began her soccer career at Cisco College, helping the Lady Wranglers become Region 5 conference champs in 2013 and 2014. Although she primarily played defense, she had 12 goals, including 3 game winners, and had 15 assists on the season. She was named to the 2013 NSCAA Junior College Division 1 All-West Region Team. 

This is not Ayers’s first time encountering Conference USA; she previously attended Louisiana Tech, playing with them during the 2015 and 2016 seasons. 

After her college career, Ayers played two seasons of professional soccer in Greece. While playing, she was a sports psychologist for the AO Trikala men’s professional team, the goalkeeping coach for the club team Ambilakia, and an assistant for the U11 boys club team.