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Conference AffiliationsOn July 1, 2006 the University of Northern Colorado officially become a member of the Big Sky Conference, the fourth major conference the Department of Athletics has been associated with since the 1920s. In Fall 1923, Northern Colorado (then known as Colorado State Teachers College) became a member of the Rocky Mountain Faculty Athletic Conference (RMFAC) and stayed a member of that conference until the spring of 1973. In the 50 years with the RMFAC, which was founded in 1909 and sometimes referred to just as the Rocky Mountain Conference, many teams came and went as members of the conference including BYU, Colorado, Colorado College, Colorado School of Mines, Colorado State, Denver, Utah, Utah State and Wyoming and future Big Sky Conference foes Idaho State, Montana and Montana State. A majority of those schools defected from the conference in 1938 to form the Skyline Conference (also known as the Mountain States Conference). The biggest change in the conference came in 1967 when the name was changed to the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference (RMAC), 10 teams joined the conferences and the league was split into two divisions). The RMAC still exists as a Division II conference today, featuring 14 schools (with Colorado being the home to a majority of the schools) including one of the original founding members in Colorado Mines. During the 1972-73 years, the RMAC was split into separate conferences for economic reasons (travel, etc.) with the Mountain Division keeping the RMAC name and the Plains Division becoming the Great Plains Athletic Conference (GPAC). So in 1972, Northern Colorado became a member of the GPAC although the GPAC and the RMAC did continue to work as allies under the name Mountain and Plains Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MPIAA). In the GPAC the Bears competed against such schools as Emporia State, Fort Hays State, Nebraska-Omaha, Pittsburg State and Washburn. Northern Colorado remained a member of this conference until the end of the 1975-76 season when they became an independent.
As the landscape of college athletics changed the NCAA created the brand new "Division II" tag to create a division from the biggest schools and smaller schools nationally. After being independent for two years, Northern Colorado officially joined the Division II North Central Conference on Jan. 1, 1979 (except for baseball, which remained a D-I Independent until 1990). For most of the years the Bears were involved in the NCC, which had its beginnings in 1922, fellow league members included Augustana (S.D.), Minnesota State at Mankato, Morningside, Nebraska-Omaha, North Dakota, North Dakota State, St. Cloud State, South Dakota and South Dakota State. In 1984 the NCC began to sponsor championships in women's sports and Northern Colorado remained in the conference until the 2002-03 season. On May 10, 2002 the department announced its intentions to reclassify to Division I and the 2002-03 season was the "exploratory" year for the reclassification. The Bears were still eligible to compete for NCAA Division II championships in 2002-03 but the season marked the program's last at that level. The 2003-04 season began the first of a four-year reclassification to be a full Division I member, a status the program will achieve beginning with the 2007-08 season (except for volleyball and wrestling, which got a waiver to begin championship competition a year earlier in 2006-07). Beginning in 2006-07, Northern Colorado becomes the ninth member of the Big Sky Conference, established in 1963, joining Eastern Washington, Idaho State, Montana, Montana State, Northern Arizona, Portland State, Sacramento State and Weber State.
Along the way from the RMFAC to the BSC, the Bears have also been members of several other affiliate conferences. Women's sports, which were not recognized and/or had sponsored championship by the NCAA until post-1984, competed under the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) rules. As a part of the AIAW, Northern Colorado competed in the Intermountain Athletic Conference (1976-82 and included teams such as Arizona, Arizona State, BYU, Colorado State, Utah, Utah State, Weber State and Wyoming) and the Continental Divide Conference (1982-88 and included teams such as Air Force, Colorado College, Denver, Metro State and Regis) for a variety of women's sports. As the Bears began the reclassification process to Division I, the football program became a charter member of the Great West Football Conference (GWFC). They were joined by Cal Poly, California Davis, North Dakota State, South Dakota State and Southern Utah, giving the teams, who would be a D-I Independent in football if not for the GWFC, a home. The Bears football program competed in the Great West in 2004 and 2005 before becoming a member of the Big Sky Conference in the 2006 season. Currently the wrestling program competes as a founding member of the Western Wrestling Conference (WWC), which starts competition in 2006-07, and the swimming & diving program has partnered with the Pacific Collegiate Swim Conference to compete in its championship at the end of the regular season. As of July 1, 2006, baseball, men's golf and softball compete as a Division I Independent. Northern Colorado Conference Affiliations
Associate Conferences
The men's basketball program was also successful in the RMAC, winning 16 titles. After joining the North Central Conference it was the women's tennis program who dominated, winning 13 titles, including 11 in a row from 1992-02. The only thing that kept the women's tennis team from extending the streak was the fact the Bears left the NCC for Division I. The men's tennis team has won 20 conference championships (10 in each the RMAC and NCC) over the years. Below is a list of the 189 championships the department has won by sport. BASEBALL MEN'S
BASKETBALL WOMEN'S
BASKETBALL WOMEN'S CROSS
COUNTRY FOOTBALL MEN'S
GOLF WOMEN'S
GOLF WOMEN'S
SOCCER SOFTBALL WOMEN'S
SWIMMING & DIVING MEN'S
TENNIS WOMEN'S
TENNIS TRACK &
FIELD VOLLEYBALL WRESTLING OTHER SPORTS |
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