The future football state of the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference.

In an announcement made today, the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference will reinstate the sport of football as an officially sponsored conference sport effective the 2024 playing season, with an automatic bid to the NCAA Division III football playoffs coming no later than 2026.

This announcement comes barely a decade after the SCAC was left with just two football-playing schools, after seven schools announced they were splitting off into a group now called the Southern Athletic Association. The new look of football in the SCAC will include the most football-playing members the conference has ever had (other than a two-year stretch), and should future-proof the SCAC in the case of Division III members changing the standard for an automatic bid to the playoffs.

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In conjunction with that announcement, the SCAC has offered football affiliate membership to Lyon, with that partnership also beginning in 2024. Lyon announced in February 2022 its intent to join Division III, and announced in August that it would join the St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, a group which does not sponsor football.

With a stated focus to reestablish football, the SCAC Presidents Council agreed in its most recent meeting that the conference will officially recognize and sponsor the sport beginning in 2024, provided that at least four institutions (via a combination of core and/or affiliate members) are willing to participate as an SCAC football member (independent of being an affiliate member of another conference).

Following internal discussions, it is expected that Austin College, Centenary (La.), Lyon and McMurry will each participate as football-playing members in the fall of 2024. The league plans to play a double round robin schedule (home and home) to provide a six-game conference schedule in that initial season’s return to the gridiron.

Centenary previously announced that it was adding football in 2024.

The SCAC Presidents Council also agreed to a flexible pathway for member schools whose preference is to continue to provide AQ opportunities for their football student-athletes throughout the transition process from their current football affiliate relationship. Trinity (Texas) currently plays its football in the Southern Athletic Association, Southwestern is moving its football program to the SAA from the American Southwest Conference, and Texas Lutheran plays football with its former conference mates in the ASC.

This transition would culminate with every conference member that sponsors the sport expected back under the SCAC umbrella by no later than the 2026 season.

With yesterday’s announcement of McMurry joining the league as a core member, and Schreiner announcing its intent to add varsity football with a tentative start date of the fall of 2025 (and by no later than 2026), the SCAC will eventually have eight total members participating in the sport – seven core members (Austin College, Centenary, McMurry, Schreiner, Southwestern, Texas Lutheran and Trinity) and one affiliate (Lyon). In conjunction with current NCAA policy, the SCAC will have an automatic bid in the sport of football by no later than the 2026 season.

“To be able to bring football back under the SCAC umbrella is something I’m not sure any of us thought we’d see again,” said SCAC commissioner Dwayne Hanberry. “In 2012, we were down to two football-playing members and now, just a decade later, to rebuild and be back to eventually eight teams – it’s an amazing achievement and a credit to our institutions who have made this commitment to provide an AQ opportunity to our football student-athletes.” Lyon College, which is currently transitioning from NAIA and is in line to become a full member of NCAA Division III in the fall of 2025, has been accepted as a core member of the St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. That league, however, does not sponsor the sport of football.

“On behalf of the college, we are ecstatic that the SCAC is offering us an associate membership in the sport of football beginning in the fall of 2024,” said Lyon athletic director Kevin Jenkins. “Our president Dr. Melissa Taverner, (head) coach Chris Douglas and I are looking forward to Lyon joining this group as we transition to NCAA Division III.”

Football was an officially sponsored sport of the conference from 1962 (when the league was formed as the College Athletic Conference) through the 2016 season. Outside of a two-year stretch in 2007 and 2008 when the league had nine football-playing members, the final expected configuration of eight football teams, along with 2009 and 2010, will be the largest in SCAC history.