HELENA — The Frontier Conference is doubling in size.
The league held its annual virtual media day for volleyball on Tuesday, introducing players and coaches from all 12 teams. And the word of the day was excitement.
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“The level of parity is crazy the last five years,” said Carroll College coach Moe Boyle. “Quite honestly, we’re excited to be playing somebody else because we play each other so often the last five years that it’s going to be exciting to watch this fall.”
The new schools added to the Frontier this year are Bellevue University, Mayville State University, Valley City State University, Dickinson State University, Bismarck State University and Dakota State University. Most of those teams come to the Frontier from the now-defunct North Star Athletic Association.
“It’s good that we’re bringing over who was left in our conference, so we don’t have to travel as far,” said Dakota State defensive specialist/libero Kate VanRooyan. “But I think the competition will be good and just the experience of traveling out there to Montana will be cool.”
And the players and coaches from the six original Frontier Conference schools — Carroll, Providence, Rocky Mountain, MSU-Northern, Montana Western and Montana Tech — said they welcome the extra competition coming to their league.
“We’re certainly looking forward to the opportunity to play in such a strong league, and now with a league that has a lot more variety,” said Montana Tech coach Brian Solomon. “I think the change in schedules is going to be refreshing for us.”
The new-look Frontier will have each team playing 22 regular-season conference games this season — 11 at home and 11 on the road.
