List of defunct college football conferences

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This is a list of defunct college football conferences in the United States and a defunct university football conference in Canada. Not all of the conferences listed here are truly defunct. Some simply stopped sponsoring football and continue under their current names, where others changed their names after changes in membership.

Disbanded conferences

Conferences whose charter no longer functions:

Canada

  • Ontario-Québec Intercollegiate Football Conference (1975-2000) – This conference existed with varying membership with many Ontario teams leaving for the current Ontario University Athletics in 1980. The remaining Ontario teams departed after the 2000 season and the remaining Quebec teams ultimately became the Quebec University Football League in 2004.

Conferences undergoing name changes

Conferences which today exist under the same charter but different names:

  • College Athletic Conference (1962–1991) – Adopted its current name of Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference in 1991, presumably to reflect its traditional geographic focus in the South.
  • Dixie Conference (1963–2003) – Now known as the USA South Athletic Conference.
  • Gateway Collegiate Athletic Conference (1985–1992), Gateway Football Conference (1992–2008) – Before 1985, the Gateway Collegiate Athletic Conference was a women's athletic conference whose membership featured several schools now in the Missouri Valley Conference (MVC). When the MVC stopped sponsoring its hybrid Division I-A (now FBS) and Division I-AA (now FCS) football league in 1985, the Gateway Conference took on football as its only men's sport. The initial football membership included the two I-AA football programs then in the MVC, plus the four final members of the AMCU football league (see "Existing conferences that dropped football" below). When the women's portion of the Gateway Conference merged with the MVC in 1992, the football conference maintained the Gateway charter, with a name change to Gateway Football Conference. In 2008, the Gateway Conference, by now featuring five current MVC members, changed its name to the Missouri Valley Football Conference to better align itself with the MVC. The two conferences, however, remain legally separate, although they operate out of the same offices in St. Louis.
  • Indiana Collegiate Athletic Conference (1987–1999) – Changed name to the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference after it began to admit schools outside Indiana. Still exists as of 2013.
  • Missouri Intercollegiate Athletic Association (1912–1992) – Changed name to the current Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association in 1992, three years after it admitted its first schools outside Missouri.
  • Nebraska Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (1969–1992), Nebraska-Iowa Athletic Conference (1992–2000) – Names changed as a result of geographic expansion. Known as the Great Plains Athletic Conference since 2000.
  • North State Conference – Also known as the North Carolina State Intercollegiate Conference from 1931 to 1957. Changed its name to the Carolinas Intercollegiate Athletic Conference in 1961 and the Carolinas-Virginia Athletic Conference in 1995 before adopting its current identity as Conference Carolinas in 2007. No longer sponsors football.
  • Before its most recent expansion, the organization now known as the Pac-12 Conference officially used three different names and unofficially used two others since the establishment of its current charter in 1959:
    • Athletic Association of Western Universities (AAWU) — Official name from 1959 through June 1968.
    • Big Five — Unofficial name used from 1959 to June 1962, when the conference consisted of charter members California, Stanford, UCLA, USC, and Washington.
    • Big Six — Unofficially adopted when Washington State joined in July 1962, and used through June 1964.
    • Pacific-8 Conference — Unofficially adopted when Oregon and Oregon State joined in July 1964; officially adopted in July 1968.
    • Pacific-10 Conference — Adopted in July 1978 with the arrival of Arizona and Arizona State, and used until Colorado and Utah joined in July 2011.
  • The Big Ten Conference is actually that league's second official name. The conference has also unofficially used two other names.
    • Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representatives — Official name from formation in 1896 until the "Big Ten" name was officially adopted in 1987.
    • Western Conference — Unofficial name used in the conference's early years.
    • Big Nine — Unofficial name first used in 1899, matching the number of members at that time. The name briefly fell out of use when Michigan was expelled from the conference in 1907, but returned when Ohio State joined in 1912. The name was again used from 1946, after Chicago left the conference, until 1949, when Michigan State joined.
    • Big Ten — Although not officially adopted until 1987, it was unofficially used for two long periods:
      • 1917–1946 (return of Michigan until departure of Chicago)
      • 1949–1987 (arrival of Michigan State until "Big Ten" officially adopted)
  • Big East Conference (1979–2013) – After major turnover in the conference membership led to the Big East splitting into FBS and non-football conferences, the FBS schools sold the Big East name to the non-FBS schools. The remaining schools began operating as the American Athletic Conference in July 2013.

Existing conferences that dropped football

Conferences which still exist, but which have dropped football as a conference sport

  • Association of Mid-Continent Universities – Founded in 1982, it absorbed the former Mid-Continent Athletic Association and sponsored Division I-AA football through the 1984 season. Of the four schools that participated in AMCU football in the 1982–84 period, three now compete at the Division I FCS level in the football-only Missouri Valley Football Conference, and the other is an all-sports member of the FCS Ohio Valley Conference. After dropping football, the AMCU (informally known as the "Mid-Continent") became the Mid-Continent Conference in 1989, and adopted its current name of The Summit League in 2007. Currently, four Summit League members sponsor football; all are MVFC members.
  • Big West Conference (1969–present) – Pacific Coast Athletic Association (1969–1988) changed name to the Big West Conference in 1988 as it admitted more schools located in the interior West. Dropped football as a conference sport after the 2000 season.
  • California Collegiate Athletic Association
  • Conference Carolinas
  • Kentucky Intercollegiate Athletic Conference
  • Missouri Valley Conference (1907–present) – Dropped football as a conference sport after the 1985 season. As noted above, the Missouri Valley Football Conference is a separate entity from the MVC, although the football conference has a licensing agreement with the MVC allowing it to use an adapted version of the MVC logo.
  • Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (1980–present) – Initially formed as a non-football conference, began sponsoring football in 1993. Dropped football after the 2007 season, after most of its member schools discontinued their football programs.
  • Western Athletic Conference (1962–present) – Dropped football as a conference sport after the 2012 season, following a near-complete membership turnover from 2011 to 2013. All but two of the WAC's football schools left the conference in that period. Both remaining football schools, Idaho and New Mexico State, will play as independents in the 2013 season before returning to football-only membership in the Sun Belt Conference in 2014 (Idaho will place its non-football sports in its former home of the Big Sky Conference at that time).

The case of the Colonial Athletic Association football conference

In 2007, the Colonial Athletic Association began sponsorship of football. However, the football conference that operates as part of the CAA has been in existence since 1938, under different charters.

The New England Conference was established in 1923 by four land-grant universities (Connecticut, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island) and one private school - Northeastern - in New England. After Northeastern left in 1945, the remaining members associated with the other New England land-grant schools (Massachusetts and Vermont) and formed the Yankee Conference in 1946 under a new charter. The new conference did not begin competition until 1947.

The conference dropped sponsorship of all sports aside from football in 1975. Over the next two decades, the conference expanded to include schools far removed from New England, but retained its name. After Vermont dropped football in 1973, the school left the Yankee Conference when it became a football-only conference. Boston University was added the same year, keeping conference membership at 6 when it became football-only.

In the 1980s, the first non-New England schools joined the Yankee Conference, with Delaware, Richmond, and Villanova becoming members in this time. James Madison and William and Mary joined the for first time in 1993, while Northeastern rejoined that same year.

In 1997, the Atlantic 10 Conference, initially formed as a non-football conference, absorbed the Yankee Conference football programs and began football sponsorship in 1997. Boston U. (dropped football) and Connecticut (joined FBS, later becoming a football member of the Big East) left soon after, to be replaced by Hofstra and Towson.

After several membership changes in the CAA in the early 2000s, the CAA had six schools with FCS football teams, and eventually, it was agreed that the CAA would take over management of the A-10 football conference. The changeover occurred in 2007.

Further illustrating the continuity between conferences, the Yankee's automatic berth in the FCS playoffs passed in succession to the A-10 and CAA.

See also

References

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