NCAA Conferences | Mid-Eastern Athletic, Mountain West, Northeast
Back with another addition to the D1 conferences list. In this one, we feature three that are distinct in their locations throughout the U.S. - the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, the Mountain West Conference, and the Northeastern Conference.
Mid-Eastern Athletic (MEAC)
The Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference was founded in 1970 by members who looked to create an organization of institutions that shared similar academic standards and a philosophy of co-curricular activities within Division I athletics for all of its sports. As it stands now, several of the original founding schools will no longer be a part of the conference after July 2o21. Of these schools, Bethune-Cookman, NC A&T, and Florida A&M are included. This means that after these two tennis programs are no longer a part of the conference, there will be 6 total schools in the MEAC with Tennis programs. Historically, these institutions are mostly public schools with lower tuition rates and acceptance rates ranging from 28%-66%.
NC A&T *
Howard, Norfolk State, and NCCU all have a total of 15 athletic teams, making them tied for the largest athletics programs.
Howard University is the only school within the top 100 in the US News & World Report Rankings
None of these schools have teams that cracked within the top 50 in last season’s ITA team rankings
The most successful team over the last couple of years has been South Carolina State.
Mountain West
The Mountain West Conference was founded in 1999 and is composed of schools located in the western part of the U.S. As reported in 2018, the conference would like to expand to other parts of the U.S., however, these moves have been dampened as of late. Given the region that these schools reside in, their tennis teams have strong competition from many high-level California programs in general. These institutions are all public universities/colleges with lower tuition and higher acceptance rates ranging from 34%-96%, with the major outlier being the U.S. Air Force Academy at 11%.
New Mexico has the largest athletics program with 8 men’s teams and 10 women’s teams. (18 total).
None of these schools are ranked within the top 100 in the US News & World Report Rankings, although the Air Force Academy has been highly regarded as a top institution.
None of these schools have teams that cracked within the top 50 in last season’s ITA team rankings.
The most successful teams over the last couple of years have been Fresno State and Utah State.
Northeast (NEC)
The Northeast Conference was established in 1981 to encompasses schools in the northeastern part of the U.S., originally as a collection of schools that focused primarily on football. It began as the ECAC Metro however it changed its name in 1988 and has stuck ever since. It has conference championships in 24 sports total, making it one of the athletics conferences with a larger sports agenda than most. Some of these sports have very deeply competitive fields on the national level, while in others there is not as much. These institutions are mostly private and as a result, have higher tuition rates. However, their acceptance rates are also relatively higher, in the range of 60%-90% on average.
Sacred Heart University has the largest sports program with 10 men’s teams and 13 women’s teams (23 total).
None of these schools are ranked within the top 100 in the US News & World Report Rankings.
None of these schools have teams that cracked within the top 50 in last season’s ITA team rankings.
Bryant University has been a clear cut leader in this conference over a long period of time.