The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), founded in 1906, is the major governing body for intercollegiate athletics in the United States and currently conducts national championships in its sponsored sports, except for the top level of football. Before the NCAA offered a championship for any particular sport, intercollegiate national championships in that sport were determined independently. Although the NCAA sometimes lists these historic championships in its official records, it has not awarded retroactive championship titles. Prior to NCAA inception of a sport, intercollegiate championships were conducted and usually espoused in advance as competitions for the national championship. Many winners were recognized in contemporary newspapers and other publications as the "national intercollegiate" champions. These are not to be confused with the champions of early 20th-century single-sport alliances of northeastern U.S. colleges that were named "Intercollegiate League" or "Intercollegiate Association." These leagues generally included some of the colleges that later became the Ivy League, as well as an assortment of other northeastern universities. Even after the NCAA began organizing national championships, some non-NCAA organizations conducted their own national championship tournaments, usually as a supplement to the NCAA events. A notable example is that of NCAA Division III men's volleyball. Although the NCAA Men's National Collegiate Volleyball Championship, established in 1970, was in theory open to D-III schools, none had received a berth in that tournament. As a result, a separate championship event, open only to D-III schools, was created in 1997. That event was discontinued after its 2011 edition once the NCAA announced it would sponsor an official Division III championship starting in 2012. The historical championship event outcomes included in the primary list section were decided by actual games organized for the purpose of determining a champion on the field of play. Lists of other championships for collegiate athletic organizations are referenced in later sections (see Table of Contents). It does not include Helms Athletic Foundation or Premo-Porretta Power Poll selections, which were awarded retrospectively.

Championship game outcomes prior/concurrent to NCAA inception

Men's teams

Baseball

NCAA from 1947.

Basketball

NCAA from 1939.

Boxing

NCAA from 1932–1960.

Cross country

Inter-Collegiate Cross Country Association (1899–1907) Inter-Collegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America (1908–37) NCAA from 1938.

Fencing

Intercollegiate Fencing Association (1894–1943) Team Foils Three-Weapon Championship † The first IFA three-weapon trophy was awarded in 1923. However, all three weapons (foil, épée, saber) were contested in the IFA tournament as early as 1920. NCAA 1941–42 and from 1947.

Football

The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) has never conducted a national championship event at the highest level of college football, currently its Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). Neither has the NCAA ever officially endorsed an FBS national champion. Since 1978, it has held a championship playoff at the next lower level of college play. Prior to 1978, no divisions separated teams, and champions were independently designated by "selectors," composed of individuals and third-party organizations using experts, polls, and mathematical methods. These efforts have continued and thrived for the higher FBS level. From the beginning, the selectors' choices have frequently been at odds with each other. The NCAA has documented both contemporaneous and retroactive choices of several major national selectors in its official NCAA Football Records Book. These selections are often claimed as championships by individual schools.

Golf

1897–1938 See Pre-NCAA college golf champions NCAA from 1939.

Gymnastics

NCAA from 1938.

Ice hockey

NCAA from 1948.

Lacrosse

NCAA from 1971.

Rifle

National Rifle Association

National Indoor Intercollegiate Match

1924–79 In the contemporary press, the type of competition utilized for this match was referred to as "shoulder-to-shoulder." This distinguished it from the "telegraphic" or "postal" form of competition. NCAA from 1980.

NRA Intercollegiate League

1909–22 Competition was held in telegraphic form using the indoor ranges of each competing school.

NRA Gallery Indoor Championship

1908 – ? The indoor intercollegiate match was a single annual indoor match open to teams of any college. It was held in telegraphic form using the indoor ranges of each competing school.

National Outdoor Intercollegiate Match

1905 – ? Matches were initially held at Sea Girt, New Jersey; after several years Camp Perry, Ohio, became the perennial venue. (This competition is not to be confused with the National ROTC outdoor rifle team championship for the William Randolph Hearst Team Trophy (first awarded circa 1922 ), which was not open to all students.)

Skiing

1921–53 Beginning in 1921, an intercollegiate winter sports championship was held annually at Lake Placid, New York, and involved colleges from the US and Canada. It combined events from downhill and slalom skiing, cross-country skiing, and ski jumping, as well as speed skating, figure skating, and snowshoeing in some years. The overall winning team received the President Harding Trophy. Prior to the 1940s, in end-of-year accounts of national sporting champions, major newspapers regarded the winning team at Lake Placid as intercollegiate champion. In the late 1930s, a major annual "four-way" (downhill, slalom, jumping and cross-country) intercollegiate event began in Sun Valley, Idaho. From the start it attracted not only college teams from the West, but also strong teams that traditionally participated in the Lake Placid meet, such as Dartmouth. After interruption by World War II, it usurped the older event. Newspaper coverage referred to the 1946 and 1947 Sun Valley winners (Utah and Middlebury, respectively) as national champions. A few days earlier than the 1947 Sun Valley meet, a similar skiing competition was held in Aspen, Colorado, overlapping the start date of the Sun Valley event. In 1948 and 1949, Aspen, rather than Sun Valley, hosted the national "four-way" intercollegiate ski championships. All of these competitions were held in the middle of the ski season rather than at the end. Then in 1950, an official annual post-season national championship event was established. This event served to influence the NCAA to add skiing as a sponsored sport, with the first NCAA title event occurring in 1954. The Intercollegiate Ski Union (ISU), a conference of schools primarily in the Northeast, also conducted annual championship events for its members. However, its geographic reach was more limited than the other competitions described. Lake Placid, New York (Wisconsin won tiebreaker.) Sun Valley, Idaho Aspen, Colorado Post-Season National Championship NCAA from 1954.

Soccer

During the periods 1926–35 and 1946–58, annual champions were selected by collegiate soccer associations based on regular season records. All are considered unofficial. For the period of 1936–45, each year's outstanding teams claim unofficial national championships. See also Intercollegiate Soccer Football Association. The Soccer Bowl (played in 1950–52) attempted to settle the national championship on the field for the 1949, 1950 and 1951 seasons. The Soccer Bowl championship games were played in January, 1950; December, 1950; and February, 1952, respectively. NCAA from 1959.

Tennis

1883–1945 See Collegiate individual tennis champions NCAA from 1946.

Tennis (indoor)

Intercollegiate Tennis Association (1973– )

Track and field (indoor)

Amateur Athletic Union (1918) Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America (1923–64) NCAA from 1965.

Track and field (outdoor)

Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America (1876–1920) ** * ** University of Chicago won the 1904 Olympic Games collegiate championship meet, defeating Princeton, Illinois, Michigan State and Colgate. † A contemporary source states, as part of an "international athletic games" (similar to the Olympics) in Chicago on June 28 – July 6, 1913, "The national intercollegiate track and field meet was won by the University of Michigan," with Southern California second and Chicago third. NCAA from 1921.

Trampoline

Until 1969, men's trampoline was one of the events that comprised the NCAA gymnastics championships. The NCAA continued to bestow a national title in trampoline for two years. For several years, there was an annual membership vote on whether to remove it as an NCAA competition, resulting in removal by 1971. Discontinued after 1970.

Volleyball

United States Volleyball Association (1949–69) NCAA from 1970. Molten Division III Men's Invitational Volleyball Championship Tournament (1997–2011) This was a championship solely for NCAA Division III schools. It was discontinued after its 2011 edition when the NCAA announced it would organize an official Division III championship starting in 2012. NCAA from 2012.

Water polo

NCAA from 1969.

Wrestling

NCAA from 1928.

Women's teams

AIAW Champions in 16 NCAA Sports

See AIAW Champions for listings of pre-NCAA champions for most of the current NCAA women's sports.

Basketball

See DGWS/AIAW Basketball Champions (1969–82) NCAA from 1982. The Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) has since 1926 conducted United States championship tournaments for women's amateur teams. On 28 occasions, small college teams (all from the central U.S.) have won the AAU women's basketball championship:

Bowling

United States Bowling Congress (formerly American Bowling Congress and Women's Intercollegiate Bowling Congress) The NCAA from 2004 has sponsored a women's team championship, apart from the USBC national championships. There were 80 schools in all divisions participating in NCAA bowling as of April, 2018.

Fencing

Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association (1929–63) National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association (1964–79) Until 1974, schools from the states of New York and New Jersey won every foil team title. ''AIAW 1980–82 (3 years). NCAA 1982–89 (8 years). NCAA (Coed) from 1990.''

Ice hockey

American Women's College Hockey Alliance NCAA from 2001.

Rifle

National Rifle Association NCAA (Coed) from 1980. Pre-NCAA Coed Rifle: see above

Rowing

The National Women's Rowing Association (NWRA) sponsored an annual open eights national championship from 1971 to 1979, among college and non-college teams. (There were no eights before 1971.) During this period, only in 1973 and 1975 did a college team win the national eights championship outright. According to US Rowing Association, contemporary news reports in 1976 and 1977 do not mention a national collegiate title. Beginning in 1980, the NWRA sponsored the Women's Collegiate National Championship, including varsity eights. In 1986 the NWRA dissolved after recognizing US Rowing's assuming of responsibility as the national governing body for women's rowing. NWRA Open National Championship, Eights top college finishers, 1971–1979 (champion in parentheses) : NWRA / US Rowing Women's Collegiate National Championship, Varsity eights :

• simultaneous AIAW championship, the only one conducted Followed by NCAA from 1997, in which women currently compete in a Varsity 8, a Second Varsity 8, and a Varsity Four.

Beach volleyball

American Volleyball Coaches Association, Collegiate Nationals NCAA from 2016.

Tennis (indoor)

Intercollegiate Tennis Association

Track and field (outdoor)

Women's National Collegiate and Scholastic Track Association Telegraphic meets conducted during specified dates each May Amateur Athletic Union The AAU conducted senior women's national track and field championships for all athletes, both indoors and outdoors, beginning in the 1920s. Two college teams won numerous championships in each sport against other clubs from throughout the country. Tuskegee Institute won the AAU national title 14 times in 1937–1942 and 1944–1951. Tennessee State won national outdoors 13 times in 1955–1960, 1962, 1963, 1965–1967, 1969 and 1978.

Track and field (indoor)

Amateur Athletic Union Tuskegee Institute won the AAU national indoor championships four times in 1941, 1945, 1946 and 1948. Tennessee State won the national title 14 times in 1956–1960, 1962, 1965–1969 and 1978–1980.

Water polo

USA Water Polo NCAA from 2001.

Champions of collegiate athletic organizations

NCAA champions

NAIA champions

NJCAA champions

USCAA champions

ACCA champions

Other sports