American Athletic Conference

The American Athletic Conference (AAC), also known as The American, is a collegiate athletic conference in the United States, featuring 13 full member universities and 6 affiliate member universities that compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA) Division I. Its football teams compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). Member universities represent a range of private and public research universities of various enrollment sizes located primarily in urban metropolitan areas in the Northeastern, Midwestern, and Southern regions of the United States.
The American's legal predecessor, the original Big East Conference, was considered one of the six collegiate power conferences of the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) era in college football, and The American inherited that status in the BCS's final season. With the advent of the College Football Playoff (CFP) in 2014, The American became a "Group of Five" conference, which shared one automatic spot in the New Year's Six bowl games during the CFP's four-team era (2014–2023) and receives one automatic spot in the current 12-team playoff.
The league is the product of substantial turmoil in the former Big East during the 2010–14 conference realignment period. It is one of two conferences to emerge from the all-sports Big East in 2013. While the other successor, which does not sponsor football, purchased the Big East Conference name, The American inherited the former Big East's structure and is that conference's legal successor. However, both conferences claim 1979 as their founding date, and the same history up to 2013. The American Athletic Conference is headquartered in Irving, Texas, and led by Commissioner Tim Pernetti, who replaced the retiring Mike Aresco on June 1, 2024.
The Big East Conference was founded in 1979 as a basketball conference and included the colleges of Providence, St. John's, Georgetown, and Syracuse, which in turn invited Connecticut (UConn), Holy Cross, Rutgers, and Boston College to be members. UConn and Boston College would accept the invitation, while Holy Cross soon thereafter declined the invitation, and Rutgers eventually declined and remained in the Atlantic 10 Conference (then known as the Eastern 8 Conference). Seton Hall was then invited as a replacement and the conference started play with seven members.
Villanova and Pittsburgh joined shortly thereafter under the leadership of the first Big East commissioner, Dave Gavitt.
The conference remained largely unchanged until 1991, when it began to sponsor football, adding Miami as a full member, and Rutgers, Temple, Virginia Tech, and West Virginia as football-only members. Rutgers and West Virginia were offered full all-sports membership in 1995, while Virginia Tech waited until 2000 for the same offer. Temple football was kicked out after the 2004 season, but rejoined in 2012 and intended to become a full member in 2013.
The unusual structure of the Big East, with the "football" and "non-football" schools, led to instability in the conference. The waves of defection and replacement brought about by the conference realignments of 2005 and the early 2010s revealed tension between the football-sponsoring and non-football schools that eventually led to the split of the conference in 2013.
The conference was reorganized following the tumultuous period of realignment that hobbled the Big East between 2010 and 2013. The Big East was one of the most severely impacted conferences during the early-2010s conference realignment period. In all, 14 member schools announced their departure for other conferences, and 15 other schools announced plans to join the conference (eight as all-sports members, and four for football only). Three of the latter group later backed out of their plans to join (one for all sports, and the other two for football only).
On December 15, 2012, the Big East's seven remaining non-FBS schools, all Catholic institutions consisting of DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John's, Seton Hall, and Villanova announced that they voted unanimously to leave the Big East Conference effective June 30, 2015. The "Catholic 7", by leaving, were looking for a more lucrative television deal than the one they would receive by remaining with the football schools. In March 2013, representatives of the Catholic 7 announced they would leave the conference effective June 30, 2013, retaining the Big East name, $10 million, and the right to hold the conference's basketball tournament at Madison Square Garden.
Following the announcement of the departure of the Catholic 7 universities, the remaining ten football-playing members started the process of selecting a new name for the conference and choosing a new site to hold its basketball tournament. Various names were considered, with the "America 12" conference reportedly one of the finalists until rejected by college presidents sensitive of adding a number to the end of the conference name. On April 3, 2013, the conference announced that it had chosen a new name: American Athletic Conference. The conference also revealed that it prefers the nickname "The American" because it was thought "AAC" would cause too much confusion with the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC).
Louisville and Rutgers spent one season in the newly renamed conference. On July 1, 2014, Louisville joined the ACC and Rutgers joined the Big Ten Conference. On that same day, East Carolina, Tulane, and Tulsa joined The American for all sports, while Sacramento State and San Diego State joined as affiliate members for women's rowing. Navy joined as an affiliate member in football on July 1, 2015.
For the next several years, The American did not discuss the addition of any new members. However, in March 2017, media reports indicated that the conference was seriously considering adding one or more new members specifically as basketball upgrades. Wichita State, Dayton, and VCU were reportedly considered, with Wichita State being seen as the strongest candidate. By the end of that month, it was reported that talks between the American and Wichita State had advanced to the point that the two sides were discussing a timeline for membership, with the possibility of the Shockers joining as a full but non-football member as early as the 2017–18 school year. The report indicated that a final decision would be made in April. The conference's board of directors voted unanimously on April 7 to add Wichita State effective in July 2017, making the Shockers the league's first full non-football member since the Big East split.
On June 21, 2019, a Boston-area sports news website, Digital Sports Desk, revealed that UConn was expected to announce by the end of the month that it would leave the American for the Big East Conference in 2020. The story was picked up by multiple national media outlets the next day. The main issue that reportedly had to be resolved prior to any official announcement was the future of UConn football, as the Big East does not sponsor that sport, and sources indicated that the American had no interest in retaining UConn as a football-only member. Reportedly, American Athletic Conference insiders were not surprised by UConn's prospective move, as that school had been vigorously opposed to that league's most recently announced television deal.
National media believed that should UConn leave the American, the conference's likeliest response would be to bring in two new schools—one for football only and a second in non-football sports, similar to the American's sequential additions of Navy and Wichita State. The most likely prospects for football-only membership were seen as Army (currently an FBS independent, with most of its other sports in the Patriot League), and Air Force (currently an all-sports member of the Mountain West Conference). Any of several schools could potentially fill the non-football slot, with Pete Thamel of Yahoo Sports considering VCU to be "the most logical target there." Thamel dismissed the prospect of the American adding a new all-sports member, saying "there's no obvious candidate who could add value in both basketball and football."
On June 24, 2019, it was reported that the Big East had formally approved an invitation for UConn to join the conference. On June 26, 2019, the UConn Board of Trustees accepted the invitation. On July 26, media reports indicated that UConn and The American had reached a buyout agreement that confirmed UConn's Big East arrival date as July 1, 2020, paying the American a $17 million exit fee.
It was widely reported that UConn was "rejoining" the Big East, given that the Huskies would be reunited with many of the schools against which it played for three decades in the original Big East. Indeed, UConn was the last charter member of the old Big East still playing in The American.
The American took a number of steps to stabilize the conference after the departure of UConn. The first move was the addition of Old Dominion University as an affiliate member in women's lacrosse for the 2020–21 season. Old Dominion was previously added to The American for women's rowing beginning in the 2018–19 season.
The American moved their headquarters from Providence, Rhode Island to Irving, Texas. This was a planned move, to better centralize the conference offices with the member schools. Irving is in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, which is also home to the headquarters of the Big 12 Conference, College Football Playoff, and the National Football Foundation. The conference also moved the men's basketball tournament to the region, to be played at the new Dickies Arena until 2022.
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, some member schools have eliminated sports due to budget constraints. The University of Cincinnati eliminated its men's soccer program while East Carolina University canceled men and women's swimming and diving teams and tennis teams. Women's rowing member San Diego State University dropped that sport effective with the end of the 2020–21 season.
In late July 2021, founding Big 12 members Oklahoma and Texas jointly announced that they planned to leave the conference no later than 2025, and formally requested an invitation from the Southeastern Conference (SEC). Shortly thereafter, The American became a peripheral player in this saga when the Big 12 sent a cease and desist letter to current broadcast partner ESPN, charging the network with conspiring to damage the league by luring Oklahoma and Texas to the SEC, and also alleging that the network encouraged an unnamed conference to raid the Big 12 to pave the way for an earlier departure by Oklahoma and Texas. A later media report identified that other conference as The American. ESPN issued an official denial of the Big 12 charges, and officials from The American declined to comment.
On September 3, Sports Illustrated reported that the Big 12 Conference was on the verge of inviting four schools— including American Athletic Conference members Cincinnati, Houston, and UCF. Later that month, all three schools received and accepted membership offers on the date of the presidents' meeting, with the official announcement stating only that they would join the Big 12 no later than 2024–25. On June 10, 2022, The American and the three departing schools announced a buyout agreement had been reached, confirming those schools' 2023 departure date. At the time, it was possible that Cincinnati and UCF could remain in the conference as affiliate members for women's lacrosse and men's soccer, respectively, as the Big 12 does not sponsor those sports, though no formal announcement was made. UCF would later accept an offer of men's soccer membership from the Sun Belt Conference effective in 2023, aligning its men's soccer program with that of West Virginia, the only pre-2023 Big 12 member sponsoring men's soccer. Cincinnati would remain in The American as a women's lacrosse affiliate, but left after the 2024 season when the Big 12 added that sport.
In late September 2021, several national media outlets reported that Mountain West Conference (MW) members Air Force and Colorado State had approached The American regarding a possible move to that league. However, on October 1, the MW announced that its current membership would remain intact for the foreseeable future, removing its 12 football members (including football-only member Hawaiʻi) from the list of potential new members for The American. For its part, The American officially denied extending invitations to the two Colorado schools.
Later that month on October 18, 2021, Yahoo Sports reported that The American was preparing to receive applications from six of the 14 members of Conference USA—Charlotte, Florida Atlantic, North Texas, Rice, UAB, and UTSA. This would make The American a 14-full-member conference. The next day, ESPN reported that all six schools had submitted applications, and that each would receive a formal letter by the end of that week (October 22) detailing the terms of conference expansion. All six schools were accepted on October 21, and the conference confirmed their 2023 entry date on June 16, 2022.
A series of further realignment moves centering on the Sun Belt Conference (SBC) led to The American's men's soccer league expanding earlier than planned. This sequence began in November 2021 when James Madison announced its departure from the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA; since renamed the Coastal Athletic Association) to join the SBC in 2023. The CAA responded by invoking a provision of its bylaws to ban JMU from further conference championship events. The SBC responded by pushing JMU's entry forward to 2022.
Soon after this, the other three CUSA members set to move to the SBC in 2023 (Marshall, Old Dominion, and Southern Miss, with Marshall and ODU sponsoring men's soccer) announced that they would instead leave in 2022. Following a brief legal dispute, CUSA and the three schools reached a settlement that allowed those schools to join the SBC in 2022. With three men's soccer schools now joining in 2022 instead of 2023, the SBC announced it would reinstate men's soccer at that time. The new full members were joined by three full SBC members and three new associate members. Coastal Carolina played the 2021 season in CUSA. The other two full SBC members, Georgia Southern and Georgia State, played in the MAC. The new associates were Kentucky and South Carolina, which had been single-sport CUSA members since 2005; and West Virginia, which had previously announced that it would move men's soccer from the Mid-American Conference to CUSA in 2022.
CUSA was then left with only four men's soccer programs for 2022 (Charlotte, FIU, Florida Atlantic, and UAB), with all but FIU set to become full American members in 2023. The American accordingly brought all four schools in as new men's soccer members for 2022, with FIU remaining an affiliate after the others fully joined The American.
Similar changes came to women's swimming & diving, again due in part to SBC expansion. Of the schools leaving CUSA for the SBC in 2022, Marshall and Old Dominion sponsor that sport, and incoming American members Florida Atlantic, North Texas, and Rice also sponsor the sport (although Rice fields swimmers only, with no divers). The American brought the aforementioned future full members, plus FIU, into its women's swimming & diving league. As with men's soccer, FIU remained a women's swimming & diving affiliate after the other schools fully joined The American.
On September 1, 2023, SMU accepted an invitation to join the Atlantic Coast Conference for the 2024–25 season. With this the American was now down one team.
On October 25, 2023, Army announced it would be joining the conference as a football-only member beginning in 2024, joining fellow service academy Navy. The annual Army–Navy Game, typically played at the conclusion of the regular season, continues to be played annually as a non-conference game and does not count towards conference standings. However, it is possible for the two teams to meet a second time in a season in the American Athletic Conference Football Championship Game, should they finish as the top two teams in the conference.
On October 25, 2024, Missouri State announced it would become an associate member in men's soccer starting with the fall 2025 season. This was followed on December 12 by the announcement that current women's lacrosse associate James Madison, Liberty, and Marshall would become associate members in women's swimming and diving beginning with the 2025-26 season.
Full members (all-sports) Full members (non-football) Affiliate members (football-only) Affiliate member (other sport) Other Conference Other Conference
The conference currently has 13 full member institutions – and six affiliate members – in 13 states, including Alabama, California, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. Wichita State is the only full member that does not sponsor football.
Seven full members have left the conference.
Six affiliate members have left the conference. Five other schools were affiliate members for one year before becoming full conference members.
The American currently sponsors championship competition in 10 men's and 11 women's NCAA sanctioned sports. James Madison, Old Dominion, and Vanderbilt are affiliate members for women's lacrosse.
Under NCAA rules reflecting the large number of male scholarship participants in football and attempting to address gender equity concerns (see also Title IX), each member institution is required to provide more women's varsity sports than men's.
Men's varsity sports not sponsored by The American which are played by conference schools:
Women's varsity sports not sponsored by The American which are played by conference schools:
Shared titles (ex: 2014 football, 2020 men's basketball) are counted as a full title for each co-champion.
Accurate as of June 14, 2023.
*- Does not include vacated championships
†- No longer a member of the AAC
‡- Affiliate member
No current American Conference member has won an NCAA team championship while a member of the conference. The only school to have won a fully recognized NCAA title while in The American, UConn, left for the Big East Conference in 2020. Several members have won national titles before joining The American. Another former member, SMU, won the 2023 equestrian title the year before it left for the ACC, but that sport does not yet have full NCAA recognition. Equestrian is recognized by the NCAA as part of its Emerging Sports for Women program, but championships are organized by the National Collegiate Equestrian Association (NCEA) instead of the NCAA.
Excluded from these lists are all national championships earned outside the scope of NCAA competition, including Division I FBS football titles, Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association titles, women's AIAW titles, NCEA titles, retroactive Helms Athletic Foundation titles, and ITA tennis titles.
Includes all titles won while a member of The American, whether or not the conference sponsored that sport at the time.
The conference began football during the 1991–92 season, and it was a founding member of the Bowl Championship Series. Previously, conference opponents operated on a two-year cycle, as a home-and-home series.
The conference previously did not have enough teams to form divisions, but it now does after Navy joined the conference in 2015. When Navy joined in 2015 and the conference's divisions were created, Navy was placed in the West division along with Houston, Memphis, SMU, Tulane, and Tulsa. Teams play eight conference games a season. Since 2015, each team has played the other five teams in its own division, as well as three teams from the other division, operating in a four-year cycle ensuring that each school will play every conference opponent at home and on the road at least once in the four-year cycle. At the end of each regular season, the East division winner and the West division winner, as determined by final conference record, meet in the American Athletic Conference Football Championship Game, played at the home site of one of the division winners.
With the departure of UConn after the 2019 season, the divisions were affected by the reduction to an uneven number of teams. At the time, The American had no plan to add another team to rebalance divisions, so the conference eliminated the divisions. The championship game is now played by the two teams that achieved the best record in regular-season conference play. While The American has had 14 football members since 2023, it has not split into divisions for football.
Like the conference itself, football experienced much transition through its history. In fact it was the main force behind such departures and expansion. In 2003, the BCS announced that it would adjust the automatic bids granted to its six founding conferences based on results from 2004 to 2007. With the addition of Cincinnati, Louisville, and South Florida in 2005, the conference retained its BCS automatic-qualifying status.
At one point, the 2007 South Florida Bulls football team was ranked No. 2 in the BCS rankings, but the team finished No. 21 in the final poll.
The 2009 Cincinnati Bearcats football team finished the regular season undefeated at 12–0, and the team was ranked No. 3 in the final BCS standings, barely missing the opportunity to play for the BCS National Championship. The conference overall was 9–7 (.563) in BCS bowl games, the third highest winning percentage among the AQ conferences.
The 2017 UCF Knights football team, a member of the American, was undefeated, but the team was not invited to the College Football Playoff. The team earned the Group of Five's New Year's Six bowl bid and defeated Auburn in the Peach Bowl. The team claimed a national championship, which was recognized by the Colley Matrix, one of the NCAA-recognized selectors of the national champion in football.
Cincinnati became the first Group of Five team ever to appear in the top four of the CFP rankings at any point of the season, going on to become the only G5 team ever selected for the CFP in its four-team era.
As of the end of the 2023 NCAA Division I FBS football season. Conference wins and losses are since the formation of The American, inclusive of championship games.
The American Championship Game pits the top two teams in the conference standings in a game held following the conclusion of the regular season. The site of the Championship Game is the home stadium of the team with the best overall conference record, with a series of tiebreakers used if needed to determine the host or either of the participants. In its first two seasons, The American awarded its championship to the team(s) with the best overall conference record. The conference split into two six-team divisions for football and first played its championship game in 2015. Through the 2019 season, the championship game involved the winners of each division and was hosted by the division champion with the best conference record. After UConn's 2020 departure, the conference reverted to a single-table format. This format continues even after the expansion to 14 teams in 2023.
The American has many rivalries among its member schools, primarily in football. Some rivalries existed before the conference was established or began play in football. Recent conference realignments in 2005, 2013, and the early 2020s ended – or temporarily halted – many rivalries. Before their departure to other conferences, a number of former member schools held longtime rivalries within the conference.
Records as of week 13 2023 Season
Following the 2013 season, the BCS era came to a close and was replaced by the College Football Playoff. Four teams play in two semifinal games, with the winners advancing to the College Football Playoff National Championship. Six bowl games — the Rose Bowl, Sugar Bowl, Orange Bowl, Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, and Peach Bowl — will rotate as hosts for the semifinal games, and host major bowls when they do not host semifinal games (access bowls).
With the birth of the College Football Playoff, The American lost its automatic qualifying status for one of the major bowls. Instead, one automatic qualifying spot is reserved for the highest ranked team from the "Group of Five" conferences – The American, Conference USA, the Mid-American Conference, Mountain West Conference, and Sun Belt Conference.
Although the pick order usually corresponds to the conference standings, the bowls are not required to make their choices strictly according to the won-lost records; many factors influence bowl selections, especially the likely turnout of the team's fans. Picks are made after any applicable College Football Playoff selections. If a team is selected for one of the access bowls or playoff, the bowl with the No. 2 pick will have the first pick of the remaining teams in the conference.
The total pay of head coaches includes university and non-university compensation. This includes base salary, income from contracts, foundation supplements, bonuses and media and radio pay.
Records as of the end of the 2022 season
Coaches and media of The American award individual honors at the end of each football season.
In June 2013, it was announced that the inaugural men's basketball tournament would take place at FedExForum in Memphis. FedExForum had previously hosted eight Conference USA basketball tournaments.
Even though the Big East Conference was meant to be a basketball-oriented conference, UConn, a member of The American, won the 2014 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament (the first after the conferences split).
This list goes through the 2022–23 season.
Source
This list goes through the 2023–24 season. Only current American Conference members are included. However, this list covers the entire histories of basketball at the listed institutions, not just their American Conference tenures.
The American has many rivalries among its member schools, some of which existed before the conference was established. Recent conference realignment in 2005 and 2013 ended – or temporarily halted – many rivalries. Before their departure to other conferences, a number of former member schools held longtime rivalries within the conference.
Results as of the 2022–23 season.
In June 2013, it was announced that the inaugural women's basketball tournament would take place at the Mohegan Sun in Connecticut. Women's basketball teams have played a total of 20 times in the NCAA Women's Division I Basketball Championship (since 1982), with UConn winning 11 national championships under head coach Geno Auriemma since 1995. Women's national championship tournaments prior to 1982 were run by the AIAW.
This list goes through the 2016–17 season.
Total revenue includes ticket sales, contributions and donations, rights and licensing, student fees, school funds and all other sources including TV income, camp income, concessions, and novelties.
Total expenses includes coach and staff salaries, scholarships, buildings and grounds, maintenance, utilities and rental fees, recruiting, team travel, equipment and uniforms, conference dues, and insurance.
The following table shows institutional reporting to the United States Department of Education as shown on the DOE Equity in Athletics website for the 2021–22 academic year.
In March 2019, the conference announced a $1 billion, 12-year media rights deal with ESPN, under which the majority of AAC content will be aired on ESPN properties. Selected basketball games were sub-licensed to CBS Sports until 2022, and most Army and Navy home football games will take place on CBS Sports until 2027 and 2028, respectively, as both schools had a previous deal with CBS prior to joining The American. Content not aired on linear television will be exclusive to ESPN's subscription package ESPN+, but a larger number of events (including at least 40 football games and 65 men's basketball games per-season, including the conference semi-finals and championship) will air on ABC and ESPN's linear networks than under the previous contract. Over 1,000 conference sporting events are aired on ESPN+ per year, including every baseball, basketball, football, lacrosse, soccer, softball, tennis, and volleyball game hosted by a conference member (unless that game is being broadcast on one of ESPN's other networks). The conference golf, rowing, swimming and diving, and track and field championships are also aired on ESPN+.