Summit League
The Summit League, or The Summit, is an NCAA Division I intercollegiate athletic conference with its membership mostly located in the Midwestern United States from Illinois on the East of the Mississippi River to the Dakotas and Nebraska on the West, with additional members in the Western state of Colorado and the Southern state of Oklahoma. Founded as the Association of Mid-Continent Universities in 1982, it rebranded as the Mid-Continent Conference in 1989. The conference changed its name from the Mid-Continent Conference on June 1, 2007. League headquarters are in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
The membership currently consists of nine full members plus four associate members. The University of Missouri–Kansas City returned as a full member after a seven-year absence with the new athletic identity of the Kansas City Roos in 2020, while Purdue University Fort Wayne left for the Horizon League. A total of 31 schools have been full members, but the only charter member remaining in the league today is Western Illinois University.
Member schools
Current members
Current full members
;NotesCurrent associate members
Future members
Future full members
Future associate members
Former members
Former full members
The Summit League has 22 former members.;Notes
Former associate members
;NotesHistory
Foundation
The association was created on June 18, 1982 at the O'Hare Hilton Hotel in Chicago, Illinois as the Association of Mid-Continent Universities that it was known as until 1989. The conference sponsored football from 1982 until 1984 at the Division I-AA level ; and current members North Dakota, North Dakota State, South Dakota, South Dakota State, and Western Illinois have FCS football programs.Changes and the addition of women's sports
The conference saw its first changes in the early 1990s. Southwest Missouri State departed for membership in the Missouri Valley Conference as the University of Akron and Northern Illinois University joined in 1990. Then Wright State University joined in 1991 as Northern Iowa followed Southwest Missouri State to the MVC.Major changes came to the conference in 1992. First, Akron left for the Mid-American Conference and another Ohio school, Youngstown State University, replaced it. More significantly, the Mid-Continent added women's sports by absorbing the North Star Conference, a women's-only league whose final seven members were in the Mid-Continent. All of the final NSC members except for Akron moved their women's sports into the Mid-Continent. At the same time, Eastern Illinois and Western Illinois moved their women's sports into the Mid-Continent when their former women's sports home, the Gateway Conference, merged into the Missouri Valley Conference. The University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee joined the Mid-Continent a year later.
Horizon and ECC transitions
In 1994, charter members Cleveland State University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the University of Wisconsin–Green Bay, as well as newer members Wisconsin–Milwaukee, Northern Illinois, and Wright State left the conference to join the Midwestern Collegiate Conference, now known as the Horizon League.The Mid-Continent absorbed Central Connecticut State University, Chicago State University, the University at Buffalo, Troy State University, and Northeastern Illinois University from the collapsed East Coast Conference in response. None of these institutions remain in the league.
Missouri-Kansas City, formerly an independent, also joined the Mid-Continent Conference in 1994.
Declining membership
Eastern Illinois moved to the Ohio Valley Conference in 1996, reducing membership to nine programs. Troy State departed for the Trans America Athletic Conference while Central Connecticut joined the Northeast Conference in 1997. Buffalo joined the MAC in 1998 while Northeastern Illinois ceased intercollegiate athletics at that time. Oral Roberts University and Southern Utah University replaced the former pair while Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis and Oakland University moved into the latter duo's spots a year later.Youngstown State switched to the Horizon League in 2001, and Centenary College replaced it in 2003. Chicago State University announced in the spring of 2006 that it would withdraw from the conference to compete as an independent starting in the 2006-07 school year. Charter member Valparaiso University then moved to the Horizon in 2007.
Renewed expansion and contraction
Conference expansion was discussed at length at the Mid-Continent Conference annual Presidents Council meeting in 2006, and Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne, North Dakota State, and South Dakota State were approved for site visits. On August 30, 2006, IPFW accepted an invitation to join the Mid-Continent Conference as a full member starting July 1, 2007. Both North Dakota State and South Dakota State also accepted invitations to join the conference the next day.The Summit League continued its renewed expansion push with the admission of the University of South Dakota. The Coyotes began conference play in the 2011–12 academic year and become eligible for all championships the following season. Centenary College subsequently announced that it would leave the Summit League following the 2010–2011 campaign.
The University of North Dakota had also been openly rumored to have been courted by the Summit League, but controversy over the Fighting Sioux nickname in all likelihood prevented UND's admission at that time. Expectations that UND would join the Summit League came to an end on November 1, 2010, when North Dakota instead accepted an invitation to join the Big Sky Conference. The University of South Dakota entered into very brief negotiations to join the Big Sky as well, rather than continuing their plans to join the Summit. However, South Dakota chose instead to remain with the more compact Summit League. As the University of Nebraska Omaha began the transition to Division I athletics in all sports, it joined the Summit League on July 1, 2012. With the departures of Centenary to Division III at the end of the 2010-11 athletic year, and Southern Utah and Oral Roberts for other Division I conferences at the end of the 2011-12 athletic year, the Summit League continued with nine institutions, all within the Midwest geographical region.
The conference unveiled the University of Denver as its 10th member on November 27, 2012, and the Pioneers joined in July 2013. While Denver is slightly outside The Summit's current Midwestern base, the city's status as a major air hub seemingly minimized travel issues for the other members. With Denver among the eight of ten WAC members switching to other conferences, that league searched for new members. UMKC announced on February 7, 2013, that it would be one of six schools joining the WAC for the 2013-14 season, dropping the Summit league back to nine member schools. Membership fell to eight schools on May 7, 2013, when Oakland announced that it was joining the Horizon League. Eight of the nine then-current Horizon League programs were former Summit League members with Oakland's move.
In December 2013, The Summit League office announced that Oral Roberts University returned to the conference in all sports, effective July 1, 2014.
The next changes to the conference's core membership were announced in 2017. First, on January 26, North Dakota, which had resolved its controversy by selecting the new nickname Fighting Hawks, unveiled as a new member beginning in 2018. Then, on June 28, IUPUI announced it would leave the conference to join the Horizon League effective July 1, 2017.
For much of 2018, speculation involving further league expansion focused on Augustana University, a Division II school located in the Summit's headquarters city of Sioux Falls. Many of the school's boosters have ties to Sanford Health, a hospital company that has long been a major league sponsor and also owns the office complex that houses the league headquarters. The university announced on December 14 that it would start a transition to Division I, though stating at the time that no such move would take place until at least 2021. The conference expanded anyway, announcing in June 2019 that UMKC would return in 2020 after a seven-year absence. However, shortly thereafter, Purdue Fort Wayne announced its 2020 departure for the Horizon League, maintaining the full-time conference membership at nine schools. Then, on October 4, 2019, the University of St. Thomas, a Minnesota school that was set to be expelled from its longtime athletic home of the NCAA Division III Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference in 2021, announced that it received an invitation to join the Summit upon its MIAC departure. St. Thomas eventually received a waiver of an NCAA rule mandating that Division III schools can only transition to Division II, allowing the school to move directly to D-I on the originally announced schedule.
Shortly before St. Thomas' future conference membership was confirmed, the University of Northern Colorado was announced as a baseball-only member effective in 2021–22.
Membership timeline
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id:Full value:rgb # Use this color to denote a team that is a member in all sports
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id:AssocF value:rgb # Use this color to denote a team that is a member for football only
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bar:1 color:Full from:1982 till:1985 text:Southwest Missouri State
bar:1 color:FullxF from:1985 till:1990
bar:2 color:Full from:1982 till:1985 text:Northern Iowa
bar:2 color:FullxF from:1985 till:1991
bar:3 color:FullxF from:1982 till:1994 text:Cleveland State
bar:4 color:FullxF from:1982 till:1994 text:UIC
bar:5 color:FullxF from:1982 till:1994 text:Green Bay
bar:6 color:Full from:1982 till:1985 text:Eastern Illinois
bar:6 color:FullxF from:1985 till:1996
bar:6 color:AssocOS from:2005 till:end text:
bar:7 color:FullxF from:1982 till:2007 text:Valparaiso
bar:7 shift: color:AssocOS from:2017 till:end text:
bar:8 color:Full from:1982 till:1985 text:Western Illinois
bar:8 color:FullxF from:1985 till:end
bar:9 color:FullxF from:1990 till:1992 text:Akron
bar:10 color:FullxF from:1990 till:1994 text:Northern Illinois
bar:11 color:FullxF from:1991 till:1994 text:Wright State
bar:12 color:AssocOS from:1992 till:1999 text:DePaul
bar:13 color:FullxF from:1992 till:2001 text:Youngstown State
bar:14 color:FullxF from:1993 till:1994 text:Milwaukee
bar:15 color:FullxF from:1994 till:1997 text:Central Connecticut State
bar:16 color:FullxF from:1994 till:1997 text:Troy State
bar:17 color:FullxF from:1994 till:1998 text:Buffalo
bar:18 color:FullxF from:1994 till:1998 text:Northeastern Illinois
bar:19 color:FullxF from:1994 till:2006 text:Chicago State
bar:20 color:FullxF from:1994 till:2013 text:Kansas City
bar:20 color:FullxF from:2020 till:end
bar:21 color:AssocOS from:1994 till:1998 text:C. W. Post
bar:22 color:AssocOS from:1994 till:1998 text:NYIT
bar:23 color:AssocOS from:1994 till:1998 text:Pace
bar:24 color:AssocOS from:1994 till:1996 text:Quincy
bar:25 color:AssocOS from:1994 till:1996 text:SIU Edwardsville
bar:26 color:AssocOS from:1996 till:1998 text:Oneonta State
bar:27 color:AssocOS from:1996 till:1999 text:Howard
bar:28 color:FullxF from:1997 till:2012 text:Southern Utah
bar:29 color:FullxF from:1997 till:2012 text:Oral Roberts
bar:29 shift: color:AssocOS from:2012 till:2014 text:
bar:29 color:FullxF from:2014 till:end text:
bar:30 color:FullxF from:1998 till:2017 text:IUPUI
bar:31 color:FullxF from:1998 till:2013 text:Oakland
bar:32 color:FullxF from:2003 till:2011 text:Centenary
bar:33 color:AssocOS from:2005 till:2007 text:South Dakota State
bar:33 color:FullxF from:2007 till:end text:
bar:34 color:FullxF from:2007 till:end text:North Dakota State
bar:35 color:FullxF from:2007 till:2020 text:Purdue Fort Wayne
bar:36 color:AssocOS from:2009 till:2011 text:South Dakota
bar:36 color:FullxF from:2011 till:end
bar:37 color:FullxF from:2012 till:end text:Omaha
bar:38 color:FullxF from:2013 till:end text:Denver
bar:39 shift: color:AssocOS from:2017 till:end text:Drake
bar:40 shift: color:AssocOS from:2017 till:end text:Illinois State
bar:41 shift: color:FullxF from:2018 till:end text:North Dakota
bar:42 shift: color:FullxF from:2021 till:end text:St. Thomas
bar:43 shift: color:AssocOS from:2021 till:end text:Northern Colorado
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text:^"The Summit League Membership History"
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- Purdue Fort Wayne joined the league as IPFW. The athletic branding was changed to "Fort Wayne" in 2016, and to Purdue Fort Wayne shortly before the dissolution of IPFW on July 1, 2018.
- Southwest Missouri State adopted its current name of Missouri State University in 2005.
- The two former members that are part of the University of Wisconsin System, namely UW–Green Bay and UW–Milwaukee, now brand themselves for athletic purposes as "Green Bay" and "Milwaukee".
- Troy State adopted its current name of Troy University in 2004.
- UMKC rebranded its athletic program as "Kansas City" in 2019, a year before its return to the league.
Sponsored sports
| Sport | Men's | Women's |
| Baseball | 5 | – |
| Basketball | 9 | 9 |
| Cross country | 7 | 8 |
| Golf | 9 | 9 |
| Soccer | 6 | 9 |
| Softball | – | 7 |
| Swimming and diving | 6 | 6 |
| Tennis | 8 | 8 |
| Track and field | 7 | 8 |
| Track and field | 7 | 8 |
| Volleyball | – | 9 |
Men's sponsored sports by school
Men's varsity sports not sponsored by The Summit League which are played by member schools:Future member St. Thomas indicated in gray; its listed affiliations reflect those in place when it joins the Summit.
| School | Football | Ice Hockey | Lacrosse | Skiing | Volleyball | Wrestling |
| Denver | — | NCHC | Big East | RMISA | — | — |
| North Dakota | MVFC | NCHC | — | — | — | — |
| North Dakota State | MVFC | — | — | — | — | Big 12 |
| Omaha | — | NCHC | — | — | — | — |
| St. Thomas | PFL | CCHA | — | — | — | — |
| South Dakota | MVFC | — | — | — | — | — |
| South Dakota State | MVFC | — | — | — | — | Big 12 |
| Western Illinois | MVFC | — | — | — | — | — |
Women's sponsored sports by school
;NotesWomen's varsity sports not sponsored by The Summit League which are played by member schools:
Future member St. Thomas indicated in gray; its listed affiliations reflect those in place when it joins the Summit.
| School | Equestrian | Gymnastics | Ice Hockey | Lacrosse | Skiing |
| Denver | — | Big 12 | — | Big East | RMISA |
| St. Thomas | — | — | WCHA | — | — |
| South Dakota State | United Equestrian Conference & National Collegiate Equestrian Association | — | — | — | — |