OREM — Before Utah Valley athletic director Jared Sumsion cut the ribbon on the $30 million, fully-funded soccer-specific stadium on the west end of the university campus, he scribbled on a napkin inside a suite at the WAC basketball tournament in Las Vegas.
He had just made a similar pitch to UCCU vice president Richard Hirsch, and sat in front of UCCU’s Jordan Perry and Utah Valley associate athletic director Matt Potts. This time, he wrote down the reasons for arguably the finest college soccer stadium in the country for the program then firmly cemented in the Western Athletic Conference.
“I put a price tag on there — that price tag has doubled since then because construction is a little more expensive nowadays,” he explained. “But it was just about what this stadium would mean for them, with 70 million cars that drive by this stadium every single year. And that helped.
“But really, they wanted to help out this community,” Sumsion added. “They wanted to give back, and they found a way to do that. They’ve done it through UVU for decades now, and this is a massive way to show everybody how big they are for this community.”
Less than two years later — a 16-month accelerated timeline, to be exact — Utah Valley cut the ribbon on UCCU Stadium, and will officially open the 3,000-seat college soccer stadium in Orem when the women’s team opens the season Monday against the University of Utah (7 p.m. MDT, ESPN+).
Initially a $20 million investment funded by a major donation from the Utah County-based credit union, additional construction costs — and a brand-new, state-of-the-art video board provided by a major donation from Provo-based Aptive Environmental — drove the project to $28.5 million.
The new stadium includes eight fully-furnished luxury suites that have already sold out for the season, a press box on the third of a four-story installation, locker rooms for both programs and their visitors, a Hall of Champions trophy display, and new concession stands, team shops and restrooms for fans underneath a student “party deck” on the east concourse.
Utah Valley forward Faith Webber films a video during the $28.5 million UCCU Stadium’s ribbon-cutting ceremony, Friday, Aug. 15, 2025 in Orem, Utah. (Photo: Sean Walker, KSL.com)
It’s a setup that stands above many college soccer programs in NCAA Division I, and rivals a few MLS clubs, men’s soccer coach Kyle Beckerman quipped.
“It has that same feeling of when we built RSL’s stadium, and the one we built when I was in Colorado,” the former Real Salt Lake legend said. “Every time I come here, I feel the same way as I did in the early days of Real Salt Lake: There’s something here, and it’s about to explode.
“Now it’s on us to give the performances to match the stadium,” he added.
It’s a new stadium fit for a new brand — complete with a soccer-exclusive crest — fitting of a champion like the three-time defending WAC regular-season champion Utah Valley women’s soccer team.
It’s already bolstered recruiting, head coach Chris Lemay acknowledged. And perhaps the most important recruit came this summer when graduated senior Faith Webber opted for one more season after leading the country in goals per game in 2024.
Webber thought her UVU career was over last fall, when the top-seeded Wolverines bounced from the WAC Tournament semifinals following a 12-5-2 season that included a 6-0-1 mark in WAC play.
But it wasn’t the way she wanted her collegiate career to end. And thanks to a court injunction spurred by Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia’s lawsuit that would grant an extra season of NCAA eligibility to certain former junior college athletes, it didn’t have to be.
“This is the only school that believed in me, so this is the only school that was going to be lucky enough to have me,” said Webber, the former WAC Offensive Player of the Year who won an NJCAA Division III title with Delta College in her native Michigan. “Having this stadium, these locker rooms, the new logo; it’s world-class, and it’s fit for a world-class team.”
Besides the Utes, Utah Valley’s home schedule also includes Cal, Auburn, LSU, Gonzaga and road trips to BYU, Utah State and Weber State before the final year of WAC play.
Sumsion added that the new stadium would be a community asset as much as a university one, with plans to host high school matches and tournaments, club championships, and even local lacrosse — in addition to the USL League Two and USL W Utah United squads that call the stadium home in the summer.
For a state with the most soccer-playing youth per capita in the United States — roughly 56,000 young athletes are registered in the Beehive State — and one that regularly places two of the best-attended NCAA Division I women’s programs nationally within 10 miles of each other, it’s a fitting tribute to the state’s soccer community.
“Utah’s a hotbed, and I think this school has ambition,” Beckerman said. “It’s constantly growing, not just in sports, but on campus, with the new business building and new construction. It’s a school that is always progressing.
“Utah is a state of sport, and soccer is a state of sport,” he added. “This is another stadium that goes along with the state’s sports history.”
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