Northern California Athletic Conference

The Northern California Athletic Conference (NCAC) was an NCAA Division II college athletic association that sponsored American football that was founded in 1925. It disbanded in 1998 after the majority of its member schools were forced to drop football.

Northern California Athletic Conference

Formerly	Far Western Conference (1925–1982)
Conference	NCAA
Founded	1925; 100 years ago (1925)
Ceased	1998; 27 years ago (1998)[1]
Division	Division II
No. of teams	16 (total)
Region	West Coast

History

The NCAC was founded as the Far Western Conference (FWC) in 1925 by its charter member schools: Fresno State, Saint Mary's, UC Davis, Nevada, San Jose State and College of the Pacific.^[2]

Nevada's departure from the conference in 1940 left the conference with only four members: Chico State, Fresno State, College of the Pacific and UC Davis.^[3] The conference looked to four nominees in Humboldt State (joined in 1940), San Francisco State, Santa Barbara State College (later UC Santa Barbara) and California Poly of San Luis Obispo.^[4]

Shortly after World War II, the remaining members, with the exception of UC Davis, Chico State and Humboldt State, would leave for other conferences, to be replaced over the years by San Francisco State (joined in 1946), Southern Oregon (1947), Sacramento State (1953), Hayward State (1961) and Sonoma State (1966). During the 1990s, each of the universities associated with the California State system chose to disband their football teams in order to comply with Title IX, with the exception of Humboldt State, which added two women's sports to achieve compliance, Sacramento State,^[1] and Cal Poly.

Members

Institution	Location	Founded	Nickname	Joined	Left	Current conference
Cal State Hayward	Hayward, CA	1956	Pioneers	1961	1998	CCAA
Chico State	Chico, CA	1887	Wildcats	1928	1998	CCAA
Fresno State	Fresno, CA	1911	Bulldogs	1925	1940	Mountain West (Pac-12 in 2026)
Humboldt State	Arcata, CA	1913	Lumberjacks	1940	1998	CCAA
Nevada	Reno, NV	1874	Wolf Pack	1925 1953	1940 1969	Mountain West
Notre Dame (CA)	Belmont, CA	1851	Argonauts	1988	1998	Discontinued athletics
Pacific (CA)	Stockton, CA	1911	Tigers	1925	1942	West Coast
Sacramento State	Sacramento, CA	1947	Hornets	1953	1985	Big Sky
St. Ignatius	San Francisco, CA	1855	Dons	1927	1929	West Coast
Saint Mary's	Moraga, CA	1863	Gaels	1925	1927	West Coast
San Francisco State	San Francisco, CA	1899	Gators	1946 1953	1951 1998	CCAA
San Jose State	San Jose, CA	1857	Spartans	1929	1935	Mountain West
Sonoma State	Rohnert Park, CA	1960	Cossacks (now Seawolves)	1966 1982	1974 1998	CCAA (Discontinuing in 2026)
Southern Oregon	Ashland, OR	1872	Raiders	1947	1953	Cascade Collegiate
Stanislaus State	Turlock, CA	1957	Warriors	1975	1998	CCAA
UC Davis	Davis, CA	1905	Aggies	1925	1998	Big West (Mountain West in 2026)

Membership timeline

Full members Full members (non-football) Football-only members

Conference champions

Football

1925: Saint Mary's 1926: Saint Mary's 1927: Saint Mary's 1928: Saint Mary's 1929: Cal Aggies 1930: Fresno State 1931: No champion 1932: Nevada & San Jose State 1933: Nevada 1934: San Jose State & Fresno State 1935: Fresno State 1936: Pacific (CA) 1937: Fresno State 1938: Pacific (CA) 1939: Nevada 1940: Pacific (CA) 1941: Pacific (CA) 1942: Pacific (CA) 1943: No champion 1944: No champion 1945: No champion 1946: No champion 1947: Cal Aggies & Southern Oregon 1948: Southern Oregon

1949: Cal Aggies 1950: San Francisco State 1951: Cal Aggies 1952: Humboldt State 1953: Chico State 1954: San Francisco State 1955: No champion 1956: Cal Aggies, San Francisco State, & Humboldt State 1957: San Francisco State 1958: San Francisco State 1959: San Francisco State 1960: Humboldt State 1961: Humboldt State & San Francisco State 1962: San Francisco State 1963: UC Davis, Humboldt State, & San Francisco State 1964: Sacramento State 1965: San Francisco State 1966: Sacramento State 1967: San Francisco State 1968: Humboldt State 1969: Cal State Hayward 1970: Cal State Hayward & Chico State 1971: UC Davis & Chico State 1972: UC Davis

1973: UC Davis & Chico State 1974: UC Davis 1975: UC Davis 1976: UC Davis 1977: UC Davis 1978: UC Davis 1979: UC Davis 1980: UC Davis 1981: Cal State Hayward & UC Davis 1982: UC Davis 1983: UC Davis 1984: UC Davis 1985: UC Davis 1986: UC Davis 1987: UC Davis 1988: UC Davis 1989: UC Davis 1990: UC Davis 1991: Sonoma State 1992: UC Davis 1993: Chico State 1994: Chico State, Humboldt State, & Sonoma State 1995: Humboldt State 1996: Chico State

^[2]

Baseball

• 1948: Chico State
• 1949: Chico State
• 1950: Chico State
• 1951: UC Davis
• 1952: Chico State
• 1953: Chico State & Sacramento State
• 1954: Chico State & Sacramento State
• 1955: Sacramento State
• 1956: Sacramento State
• 1957: Sacramento State
• 1958: Sacramento State
• 1959: Sacramento State & Chico State
• 1960: Sacramento State
• 1961: Sacramento State & San Francisco State
• 1962: San Francisco State
• 1963: San Francisco State
• 1964: Sacramento State
• 1965: Sacramento State
• 1968: Sacramento State
• 1969: Sacramento State & San Francisco State
• 1970: Sacramento State
• 1971: Sacramento State
• 1972: Cal State Hayward
• 1973: UC Davis
• 1974: Sacramento State & UC Davis
• 1975: Sacramento State
• 1976: UC Davis
• 1977: Cal State Hayward
• 1978: Chico State
• 1979: UC Davis
• 1983: San Francisco State & Chico State
• 1984: UC Davis
• 1985: Sacramento State (Final season in league), Chico State, & UC Davis
• 1986: San Francisco State
• 1987: Chico State
• 1989: San Francisco State
• 1990: Sonoma State UC Davis
• 1991: Sonoma State
• 1992: Sonoma State
• 1993: UC Davis
• 1994: UC Davis
• 1995: San Francisco State
• 1996: Chico State
• 1997: Chico State
• 1998: Sonoma State & Chico State

Total Baseball Championships

• Sacramento State - 18
• Chico State - 14
• UC Davis - 9
• San Francisco State - 8
• Sonoma State - 4
• Cal State Hayward - 2

Women's volleyball

• 1982: Sacramento State
• 1983: Sacramento State
• 1984: Sacramento State
• 1995: Sonoma State
• 1997: Sonoma State

Men's soccer

• 1974: Cal-State Hayward
• 1975: Cal-State Hayward
• 1976: Cal-State Hayward
• 1977:
• 1978:
• 1979:
• 1980:
• 1981:
• 1982: Cal-State Hayward
• 1983: Cal-State Hayward
• 1984: Cal-State Hayward
• 1985: Chico State
• 1986: Chico State
• 1987: Chico State
• 1988: Cal-State Hayward
• 1989: Cal-State Hayward
• 1990: Sonoma State
• 1991: Sonoma State
• 1993: Sonoma State
• 1995: Sonoma State
• 1996: Sonoma State
• 1997: Sonoma State

Women's soccer

• 1982:
• 1983: Cal-State Hayward
• 1984: Cal-State Hayward
• 1985: Cal-State Hayward
• 1986: Cal-State Hayward
• 1987: Cal-State Hayward
• 1988: Cal-State Hayward (National champions)

Women's basketball

• 1998: Sonoma State

Softball

• 1978: Fresno State
• 1982: Fresno State
• 1983: Fresno State
• 1985: Fresno State
• 1986: Fresno State

See also

• List of defunct college football conferences
• California Coast Conference (1922–1928)