The Mid-American Conference (MAC) is a collegiate athletic conference with a membership base mostly in the Great Lakes region, stretching from Massachusetts to California. Its members compete in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I. For football, the conference participates in the NCAA's Football Bowl Subdivision. Nine of the twelve full member schools are in Ohio and Michigan, with single members located in Indiana, Massachusetts, California, and New York.
The MAC is headquartered in the Public Square district in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, and has two members in the nearby Akron area. The conference ranks highest among all ten NCAA Division I FBS conferences for graduation rates.
History The five charter members of the Mid-American Conference were Ohio University, Butler University, the University of Cincinnati, Wayne University (now Wayne State University), and Western Reserve University, one of the predecessors to today's Case Western Reserve University. Wayne University left after the first year. Miami University and Western Michigan University took the place of those charter members for the 1948 season. The MAC added the University of Toledo (1950), Kent State University (1951), and Bowling Green State University (1952). The University of Cincinnati resigned its membership February 18, 1953, with an effective date of June 1, 1953. Cincinnati's decision was based on a new requirement that at least 5 conference football games would have to be scheduled each season, university president Raymond Walters saying they "...regretfully resign...as the university could not continue under the present setup..."The Lima News, February 19, 1953
The membership was steady for the next two decades except for the addition of Marshall University in 1954 and the departure of Western Reserve in 1955. Marshall was expelled from the conference in 1969 due to NCAA violations. The first major expansion since the 1950s took place in the mid-1970s with the addition of Central Michigan University and Eastern Michigan University in 1972 and Ball State University and Northern Illinois University in 1973. NIU left after the 1985–86 season. The University of Akron joined the conference in 1992. The conference became the largest in Division I-A with the re-admittance of Marshall and NIU in 1997 and addition of the Bulls from the University at Buffalo in 1998. The University of Central Florida, a non-football all-sports member in the Atlantic Sun Conference at the time, joined for football only in 2002, becoming the first football-only member in conference history. Marshall and Central Florida left after the 2004–05 academic year, both joining Conference USA in all sports.
In May 2005, the Temple Owls in Philadelphia signed a six-year contract with the MAC as a football-only school and began play in the East Division in 2007.
The Louisville Cardinals were a MAC affiliate for field hockey for a number of years when Louisville was a member of the Metro Conference and Conference USA, winning two MAC tourney titles in 2003 and 2004.
The Missouri State Bears, Evansville Purple Aces, and Southern Illinois Salukis participate in the MAC for men's swimming and diving. In 2012, the West Virginia Mountaineers joined the Florida Atlantic Owls and Hartwick College Hawks as men's soccer affiliates. Florida Atlantic departed upon joining Conference USA in 2013. Hartwick's contract was not renewed by the MAC in 2015. Nine schools are wrestling affiliates; most became affiliates when the MAC absorbed the former Eastern Wrestling League in 2019. Appalachian State University and Longwood University are associates in field hockey; Missouri State had also been a member in that sport from 2005 until dropping field hockey after the 2016 season. Binghamton University is an affiliate in men's tennis. In June 2017, SIU Edwardsville (SIUE) was invited to become an affiliate member in both men's soccer and wrestling in 2018. When Buffalo suddenly dropped four sports, including men's soccer, SIUE's move in that sport was made immediately.
The UMass Minutemen joined the MAC as a football-only member in July 2012; the university announced that the team would leave the MAC at the end of the 2015 season due to contractual issues.UMass Football Will Leave Mid-American Conference at End of 2015 - University of Massachusetts Official Athletic Site . Umassathletics.com (March 26, 2014). Retrieved on 2014-04-12. Meanwhile, Temple ended its affiliation with the MAC in football and joined the Big East for football in July 2012. Following the split of the Big East into football-sponsoring and non-football conferences in July 2013, Temple became a full member of the football-sponsoring portion, the American Athletic Conference, ending its membership in the Atlantic 10 at that time. The Chicago State Cougars were an affiliate for men's tennis until joining the Western Athletic Conference, which sponsors that sport, in July 2013.
The conference unveiled the addition of women's lacrosse to its sport sponsorship in November 2019. Lacrosse began competing under the MAC banner with six teams in the 2021 season with MAC members Akron, Central Michigan and Kent State joined by associate members Detroit Mercy, Robert Morris, and Youngstown State. Eastern Michigan became the seventh women's lacrosse member when it added the sport in the 2022 season.
At the end of the 2022 season, the MAC discontinued men's soccer as a sponsored sport. While the conference realignment of the early 2020s did not affect the MAC's core membership up to that time, it significantly impacted the amount of men's soccer sponsoring programs within the conference, and ultimately led to the conference lacking enough teams to maintain its automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. Of the four full MAC members that sponsored men's soccer in the 2022 season, Bowling Green, Northern Illinois, and Western Michigan moved the sport to the Missouri Valley Conference, and Akron moved it to the Big East Conference.
The MAC eliminated its East and West divisions for football in January 2024. The divisions had already been eliminated for other sports in 2020. Later that year, in late February, it was announced that the UMass Minutemen and Minutewomen will join the conference as a full member beginning in 2025, returning UMass football to the MAC. In July, the conference announced that it would begin sponsoring women's rowing for the 2025–26 season; full members Eastern Michigan, Toledo, and UMass would be joined by affiliate members Delaware, High Point, and Temple.
On January 3, 2025, it was reported that Northern Illinois had accepted an invitation from the Mountain West Conference to join as an affiliate member for football in 2026. This move was made official on January 7, after approval by NIU's governing board. Current MAC bylaws stipulate that all members must play football within the conference; correspondingly, multiple media reports in February 2025 indicated that NIU was set to rejoin the Horizon League, a non-football conference in which it had been a member from 1994 to 1997, in 2026. This move was also made official on February 27, after approval by NIU's governing board. NIU applied to maintain MAC affiliate membership in women's gymnastics and men's wrestling, neither of which the Horizon sponsors. However, this did not come to pass, and NIU instead joined the Mountain West and the Pac-12 Conference as an affiliate for those respective sports. In football, NIU's membership was effectively replaced by the addition of Sacramento State in July 2026, resulting in the conference's footprint in that sport stretching from Massachusetts to California.
Sacramento State is officially moving to the FBS level and will be joining the Mid-American Conference (MAC) as a football-only member starting in July 2026 for a five-year term. As a distant member, Sacramento State faces heavy travel, but this is viewed as a necessary step for FBS status. Only the football program is joining the Mid-American Conference (MAC). They will compete in the Big West in all other sports. They will be the first western based team ever to join the Mid-American Conference (MAC). Sacramento State will as part of its agreement to join the Mid-American Conference (MAC) cover all air travel costs for visiting conference football teams to Sacramento. This arrangement is for the duration of the five-year term beginning July 1, 2026. The school must pay an $18 million entry fee just to join the Mid-American Conference (MAC), with $6 million due in the first year. An additional $5 million must be paid to the NCAA for the transition from FCS to FBS. Sacramento State President Luke Wood projects that the move will generate nearly $975 million in local economic impact for the school over the five-year period. It is not known at this point if the former FCS school who tried to join the new Pac-12 and Mountain West prior to this will remain in the conference after the 5-year agreement. The school was actually at one point denied by the NCAA the right to become an FBS school.
Member universities Membership map
Current full members There are twelve public universities with full membership:
Institution Location Founded Type Enrollment Median earnings Endowment Nickname Joined Colors University of Akron Akron, Ohio 1870 Public 15,318 $62,809 $235 Zips 1992 Ball State University Muncie, Indiana 1918 Public 20,200 $57,619 $325 Cardinals 1973 Bowling Green State University Bowling Green, Ohio 1910 Public 19,484 $54,998 $155 Falcons 1952 University at Buffalo Buffalo, New York 1846 Public 32,347 $71,430 $1,020 Bulls 1998 Central Michigan University Mount Pleasant, Michigan 1892 Public 14,500 $61,298 $246 Chippewas 1971 Eastern Michigan University Ypsilanti, Michigan 1849 Public 12,176 $59,616 $94 Eagles 1971 Kent State University Kent, Ohio 1910 Public 26,822 $56,839 $301 Golden Flashes 1951 University of Massachusetts Amherst Amherst, Massachusetts 1863 Public 31,300 $78,620 $1,500 Minutemen &Minutewomen 2025 Miami University Oxford, Ohio 1809 Public 22,460 $70,785 $814 RedHawks 1947 Ohio University Athens, Ohio 1804 Public 30,682 $70,528 $879 Bobcats 1946 University of Toledo Toledo, Ohio 1872 Public 13,165 $66,084 $625 Rockets 1950 Western Michigan University Kalamazoo, Michigan 1903 Public 17,331 $62,885 $760 Broncos 1947
Notes
Current affiliate members As of 2026–27, 21 schools have MAC affiliate membership status. On July 1, 2012, Temple joined the Big East Conference for football only (the school's other sports would join the Big East/American for 2013–14), and Massachusetts replaced Temple as a football-only member in the MAC East Division. On September 19, 2012, the MAC announced Missouri, Northern Iowa and Old Dominion would join as wrestling affiliates; as the Southeastern and Missouri Valley Conferences do not sponsor wrestling. Missouri and Northern Iowa participated only in the conference tournament in the 2012–13 school year, and began full conference play in 2013–14. Old Dominion did not begin MAC competition until 2013–14, when it left the Colonial Athletic Association (which had sponsored wrestling, but no longer does so) for Conference USA (which has never sponsored the sport). Old Dominion discontinued wrestling in April 2020.
On July 1, 2013, Florida Atlantic's men's soccer program moved with the rest of its athletic program to Conference USA, and Chicago State's men's tennis team followed the rest of its sports to the Western Athletic Conference.
The 2014–15 school year saw one affiliate member leave for another conference and two new affiliates join. The Hartwick men's soccer team left the MAC for the Sun Belt Conference, which had announced in February 2014 that it would reinstate men's soccer, a sport that it last sponsored in 1995, for the 2014 season. The new affiliates for 2014-15 were Binghamton in men's tennis and Longwood in field hockey.