Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association


The Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association was one of the first collegiate athletic conferences in the United States. Twenty-seven of the current Division I FBS football programs were members of this conference at some point, as were at least 19 other schools. Every member of the current Southeastern Conference except Arkansas and Missouri, as well as six of the 15 current members of the Atlantic Coast Conference plus the University of Texas at Austin, now of the Big 12 Conference, formerly held membership in the SIAA.

History

The SIAA was founded on December 21, 1894, by Dr. William Dudley, a chemistry professor at Vanderbilt, at the Kimball House in Atlanta. Dudley was a member of the Vanderbilt Athletic Association, formed in 1886 with Dr. W. M. Baskerville as president. Most students at Vanderbilt were members. The early sports played on the Vanderbilt campus were baseball, bicycling, and track and field events. Dudley was primarily responsible for the formation of the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association. The first advance in the direction of its formation was in March 1888 when the Vanderbilt Athletic Association endeavored to secure track and field meets at Vanderbilt from Southwestern Presbyterian University, Sewanee, and Tennessee. Sewanee's opposition stopped it from occurring.
The original members were Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Johns Hopkins, North Carolina,, Vanderbilt, and Virginia. Virginia and North Carolina soon dropped out, even before the inaugural 1895 season.
Central, Clemson, Cumberland, Kentucky, LSU, Mercer, Mississippi A&M, Southwestern Presbyterian University, Texas, Tulane, and the University of Nashville joined the following year in 1895 as invited charter members. The conference was originally formed for "the development and purification of college athletics throughout the South". They crafted a constitution, created an Executive Committee, elected officers, and set rules for:
The league did not, however, sponsor much in the way of championship competition for its member schools. It did hold an annual track and field competition for a trophy, and it also held some basketball tournaments over the years, but apparently some member schools did not compete in the tournament during some years, and sometimes non-member southern schools were even allowed to compete in it as well. In 1903, a single-game football playoff occurred, but it seems to have been coordinated more so by the two competing schools than the conference itself. Several other efforts over the years by individual schools to hold a conference title game fell through. Most SIAA titles claimed by schools in various sports were actually more mythical in nature than officially sanctioned by the league. Indeed, some schools centrally-located in the conference played far more conference games than others on the periphery, making it difficult to form a fair comparison to determine just which team was truly the best, especially once the league began to constantly expand its membership.
In 1915, a disagreement arose within the conference regarding the eligibility of freshman athletes, the so-called "one-year rule." Generally, the larger universities opposed the eligibility of freshman players, while the smaller schools favored it. As a result, some of the large universities formed the Southern Intercollegiate Conference, which used the one-year rule, while still maintaining membership within the SIAA.
At the conference's annual meeting on December 10, 1920, the SIAA rejected proposals to ban freshman athletes and abolish paid summer baseball. In protest, some schools that had voted in favor of the propositions immediately announced they would seek to form a new conference. On February 25, 1921, Alabama, Auburn, Clemson, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Kentucky, Mississippi State, and Tennessee left the SIAA to form the Southern Conference, along with non-SIAA members Maryland, North Carolina, North Carolina State, Virginia, Virginia Tech, and Washington and Lee. In 1922, the Southern Conference underwent an expansion and added six more members, all at the expense of the SIAA: Florida, Louisiana State, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tulane, and Vanderbilt.
With the departure of most of the major colleges, the SIAA became a de facto small college conference in 1923. In the 1920s and 1930s, the SIAA increased its membership with the addition of many additional small universities. The conference eventually disbanded in 1942 with the onset of American involvement in World War II. League archives were kept at Vanderbilt, the league's founding school, but the building housing the archives was eventually gutted with fire, taking countless irreplaceable items pertaining to the SIAA's history with it.
In 1947 there was an attempt, led by Western Kentucky, to revive the SIAA. Western Kentucky hosted an SIAA basketball tournament that turned out to be little more than an invitational tournament because former SIAA members declined to participate.

Membership

Original charter members are denoted in boldface. Invited charter members are denoted with an asterisk. In the era in which the SIAA operated, teams tended to join in December; therefore, the first year of conference play in a given sport was often the following calendar year.
Conference affiliations reflect those for the 2016–17 school year.
SchoolCityStateTenureConference left forCurrent conference
AlabamaTuscaloosaAlabama1895–1917, 1919–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
AuburnAuburnAlabama1895–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
CentenaryShreveportLouisiana1925–1941Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference
Central UniversityRichmondKentucky1896-1897, 1899-1900merged with Centre College in 1901
CentreDanvilleKentucky1910–1917, 1919–1941Southern Athletic Association
ChattanoogaChattanoogaTennessee1914–1916, 1919–1932Dixie ConferenceSouthern Conference
CharlestonSouth Carolina1908–1935Southern ConferenceSouthern Conference
ClemsonClemsonSouth Carolina1896–1921Southern ConferenceAtlantic Coast Conference
Cumberland*LebanonTennessee1896–1907Mid-South Conference
Delta StateClevelandMississippi1936–1941Gulf South Conference
Emory & HenryEmoryVirginia1936–1941Old Dominion Athletic Conference
ErskineDue WestSouth Carolina1925–1941Conference Carolinas
FloridaGainesvilleFlorida1912–1917, 1919–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
FurmanGreenvilleSouth Carolina1902–1904, 1906–1910, 1914–1929, 1932–1935Southern ConferenceSouthern Conference
Georgetown GeorgetownKentucky1915–1916, 1919–1941Mid-South Conference
GeorgiaAthensGeorgia1895–1916, 1919–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
Georgia TechAtlantaGeorgia1896–1900, 1902–1913, 1916–1921Southern ConferenceAtlantic Coast Conference
Howard College HomewoodAlabama1909–1912, 1914–1917, 1919–1931Dixie ConferenceSouthern Conference
Jacksonville StateJacksonvilleAlabama1939–1940Ohio Valley Conference
Johns HopkinsMarylandPart of 1894Centennial Conference
Kentucky*LexingtonKentucky1896–1904, 1911–1916, 1919–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
Kentucky WesleyanOwensboroKentucky1925–1930Great Midwest Athletic Conference
Louisiana CollegePinevilleLouisiana1922–1941American Southwest Conference
Louisiana State*Baton RougeLouisiana1896–1917, 1919–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
Louisiana TechRustonLouisiana1925–1942Louisiana Intercollegiate ConferenceConference USA
LouisvilleLouisvilleKentucky1914–1941Atlantic Coast Conference
Loyola University New OrleansNew OrleansLouisiana1925, 1930–1937Southern States Athletic Conference
Memphis State MemphisTennessee1935–1942IndependentAmerican Athletic Conference
Mercer*MaconGeorgia1896–1937Southern Conference
Miami Coral GablesFlorida1929–1942IndependentAtlantic Coast Conference
Middle TennesseeMurfreesboroTennessee1931–1942Conference USA
MillsapsJacksonMississippi1908–1909, 1913–1938Southern Athletic Association
MississippiOxfordMississippi1898–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
Mississippi CollegeClintonMississippi1910–1917, 1919–1941American Southwest Conference
Mississippi A&M* StarkvilleMississippi1896–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
Morehead StateMoreheadKentucky1934–1942Ohio Valley Conference
Murray StateMurrayKentucky1931–1942Ohio Valley Conference
Nashville*NashvilleTennessee1896–1900, 1902–1908University closed in 1909
NewberryNewberrySouth Carolina1922–1942South Atlantic Conference
North CarolinaChapel HillNorth CarolinaPart of 1894, 1899–1901South Atlantic Intercollegiate Athletic AssociationAtlantic Coast Conference
Northwestern StateNatchitochesLouisiana1928–1941Southland Conference
OglethorpeAtlantaGeorgia1919–1929, 1937–1941Southern Athletic Association
PresbyterianClintonSouth Carolina1921–1942Big South Conference
RollinsWinter ParkFlorida1925–1942Sunshine State Conference
SewaneeTennessee1895–1900, 1902–1924Southern ConferenceSouthern Athletic Association
South CarolinaColumbiaSouth Carolina1915–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
Southern LakelandFlorida1925–1930Sunshine State Conference
Southern MississippiHattiesburgMississippi1928–1941Conference USA
Southern University BirminghamAlabama1901–1912; 1930–1931Dixie ConferenceSouthern Athletic Association
Southwestern Presbyterian* MemphisTennessee1896–1900, 1902–1903Southern Athletic Association
Southwestern Louisiana LafayetteLouisiana1925–1942Sun Belt Conference
Spring HillMobileAlabama1927–1931Dixie ConferenceSouthern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference
StetsonDeLandFlorida1925–1931, 1933–1940Atlantic Sun Conference
TampaTampaFlorida1936–1942Sunshine State Conference
TennesseeKnoxvilleTennessee1897–1916, 1919–1921Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
Tennessee TechCookevilleTennessee1933–1942Ohio Valley Conference
Texas*AustinTexas1896–1903SWIAABig 12 Conference
TransylvaniaLexingtonKentucky1914–1916, 1919–1924, 1926–1941Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference
Trinity College DurhamNorth Carolina1903–1912Atlantic Coast Conference
Troy State TroyAlabama1936–1942no team Sun Belt Conference
Tulane*New OrleansLouisiana1896–1906, 1911–1917, 1919–1921Southern ConferenceAmerican Athletic Conference
Union BarbourvilleKentucky1933–1941Appalachian Athletic Conference
Union JacksonTennessee1925–1942Gulf South Conference
VanderbiltNashvilleTennessee1895–1924Southern ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
VirginiaCharlottesvilleVirginiaPart of 1894
Western KentuckyBowling GreenKentucky1926–1942Conference USA
WoffordSpartanburgSouth Carolina1903–1942Southern Conference

Timeline


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bar:1 color:powderblue from:1894 till:1895 text:Johns Hopkins
bar:2 color:powderblue from:1894 till:1895 text:North Carolina
bar:2 color:powderblue from:1901 till:1902
bar:3 color:powderblue from:1894 till:1895 text:Virginia
bar:4 color:powderblue from:1895 till:1917 text:Alabama
bar:4 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1921
bar:5 color:powderblue from:1895 till:1921 text:Auburn
bar:6 color:powderblue from:1895 till:1916 text:Georgia
bar:6 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1921
bar:7 color:powderblue from:1895 till:1900 text:
bar:7 color:powderblue from:1902 till:1924
bar:8 color:powderblue from:1895 till:1924 text:Vanderbilt
bar:9 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1900 text:Georgia Tech
bar:9 color:powderblue from:1902 till:1913
bar:9 color:powderblue from:1916 till:1921
bar:10 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1921 text:Clemson
bar:11 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1907 text:Cumberland
bar:12 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1904 text:Kentucky
bar:12 color:powderblue from:1911 till:1916
bar:12 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1921
bar:13 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1917 text:LSU
bar:13 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1921
bar:14 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1937 text:Mercer
bar:15 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1921 text:Mississippi A&M
bar:16 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1900 text:Nashville
bar:16 color:powderblue from:1902 till:1908
bar:17 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1900 text:Southwestern Presbyterian
bar:17 color:powderblue from:1902 till:1903
bar:18 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1903 text:Texas
bar:19 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1906 text:Tulane
bar:19 color:powderblue from:1911 till:1917
bar:19 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1921
bar:20 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1916 text:Tennessee
bar:20 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1921
bar:21 color:powderblue from:1896 till:1897 text:Central
bar:21 color:powderblue from:1899 till:1900
bar:21 color:powderblue from:1928 till:1942
bar:22 color:powderblue from:1897 till:1921 text:Mississippi
bar:24 color:powderblue from:1898 till:1900 text:Furman
bar:24 color:powderblue from:1902 till:1904
bar:24 color:powderblue from:1906 till:1910
bar:24 color:powderblue from:1914 till:1929
bar:24 color:powderblue from:1932 till:1935
bar:25 color:powderblue from:1901 till:1912 text:Southern University
bar:26 color:powderblue from:1903 till:1912 text:Trinity College
bar:28 color:powderblue from:1909 till:1935 text:The Citadel
bar:29 color:powderblue from:1909 till:1912 text:Howard College
bar:29 color:powderblue from:1914 till:1917
bar:29 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1931
bar:29 color:powderblue from:1933 till:1938
bar:31 color:powderblue from:1910 till:1917 text:Mississippi College
bar:31 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1941
bar:32 color:powderblue from:1910 till:1917 text:Centre
bar:32 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1941
bar:33 color:powderblue from:1911 till:1917 text:Florida
bar:33 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1921
bar:34 color:powderblue from:1914 till:1916 text:Chattanooga
bar:34 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1932
bar:35 color:powderblue from:1914 till:1941 text:Louisville
bar:36 color:powderblue from:1915 till:1916 text:Georgetown
bar:36 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1941
bar:37 color:powderblue from:1915 till:1916 text:Transylvania
bar:37 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1924
bar:37 color:powderblue from:1926 till:1941
bar:38 color:powderblue from:1915 till:1921 text:South Carolina
bar:39 color:powderblue from:1916 till:1942 text:Wofford
bar:40 color:powderblue from:1919 till:1929 text:Oglethorpe
bar:40 color:powderblue from:1937 till:1941
bar:41 color:powderblue from:1920 till:1938 text:Millsaps
bar:42 color:powderblue from:1922 till:1931 text:Birmingham-Southern
bar:43 color:powderblue from:1923 till:1942 text:Newberry
bar:44 color:powderblue from:1923 till:1942 text:Presbyterian
bar:45 color:powderblue from:1924 till:1941 text:Louisiana College
bar:46 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1941 text:Erskine
bar:47 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1941 text:Centenary
bar:48 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1930 text:Kentucky Wesleyan
bar:49 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1942 text:Louisiana Tech
bar:50 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1926 text:Loyola N.O.
bar:50 color:powderblue from:1930 till:1937
bar:51 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1942 text:Rollins
bar:52 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1930 text:Southern
bar:53 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1942 text:Southwestern Louisiana
bar:54 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1931 text:Stetson
bar:54 color:powderblue from:1933 till:1940
bar:55 color:powderblue from:1925 till:1942 text:Union
bar:56 color:powderblue from:1926 till:1942 text:Western Kentucky
bar:57 color:powderblue from:1927 till:1931 text:Spring Hill
bar:58 color:powderblue from:1928 till:1941 text:Northwestern State
bar:59 color:powderblue from:1928 till:1941 text:Southern Miss
bar:60 color:powderblue from:1929 till:1942 text:Miami
bar:61 color:powderblue from:1931 till:1942 text:Middle Tennessee State
bar:62 color:powderblue from:1931 till:1942 text:Murray State
bar:63 color:powderblue from:1933 till:1942 text:Tennessee Tech
bar:64 color:powderblue from:1933 till:1941 text:Union
bar:65 color:powderblue from:1934 till:1942 text:Morehead State
bar:66 color:powderblue from:1935 till:1942 text:Memphis State
bar:67 color:powderblue from:1936 till:1941 text:Delta State
bar:68 color:powderblue from:1936 till:1941 shift: text:Emory & Henry
bar:69 color:powderblue from:1936 till:1942 text:Tampa
bar:70 color:powderblue from:1936 till:1942 text:Troy State
bar:71 color:powderblue from:1939 till:1940 shift: text:Jacksonville State
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Conference champions