page_title: Cumberland University
section_title: Athletics
hierarchical_section_title: Cumberland University / Athletics
caption_attribution_description: English: Cumberland University in Lebanon.
context_page_description: Cumberland University is a private university in Lebanon, Tennessee. It was founded in 1842, though the current campus buildings were constructed between 1892 and 1896.
context_section_description: Cumberland University teams, nicknamed athletically as the Phoenix, are part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), primarily competing in the Mid-South Conference. The Phoenix formerly competed in the TranSouth Athletic Conference. Men's sports include baseball, basketball, cross country, football, golf, soccer, tennis and wrestling; while women's sports include basketball, cross country, golf, soccer, softball, tennis and volleyball.
  Cumberland football began on October 26, 1894 with a 6–6 tie with Peabody and finished that first year with a 2–1–1 season record. The early days of Cumberland football were very promising. The pinnacle of the early days of CU football was the 1903 season that began with a (6–0) win over Vanderbilt then a (0–6) loss to Sewanee and continued with a five-day road trip with victories over Alabama (44–0) November 14, 1903, LSU (41–0) November 16, 1903, and Tulane (28–0) November 18, 1903. Cumberland would play a postseason game against Coach John Heisman's Clemson team on Thanksgiving Day that ended in an 11–11 tie and a record of 4–1–1  which gave Coach A.L. Phillips and Cumberland University the Championship of the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association. The 1916 game against Georgia Tech is famous as the most lopsided-scoring game in the history of college football, which was a 0–222 loss for Cumberland University.
  Cumberland's baseball program is probably its best-known athletic team, especially those of the 2004, 2010, and 2014 baseball seasons, which won the World Series of the NAIA; the 1995 and 2006 teams were runner-up in this event.
  In addition, Cumberland achieved a top-ten finish at the National Collegiate Cycling Association's National Championship, its women's basketball team finished as NAIA National Tournament Runner-Up in 2007, and Cumberland achieved a National Tournament appearance for the No. 17-ranked Men's Tennis Team in 2007.  The men's basketball team also earned success in the 2008–2009 basketball season earning another trip to the National Tournament.
  Cumberland University's Women's Basketball team won the Mid-South Conference title in 2012–2013 and lost in semi finals of the NAIA national tournament in Frankfort Kentucky
  For the 2008 season, CU's football earned a share of the Mid-South Conference West Division.
  On August 7, 2013, Cumberland University was granted provisional membership into the Great Midwest Athletic Conference (G-MAC) after a vote of league presidents, paving the way for the University to apply to the NCAA for admittance into Division II in February 2014. Cumberland's application to join Division II was denied in 2014.
  On January 4, 2016, Cumberland University changed the nickname of its athletic program from "Bulldogs" to "Phoenix", stating that, "For more than 150 years, the Phoenix has personified the spirit of Cumberland University."
  The 2017 soccer season for the women's program was a successful one. Head coach, Brian Davies, lead his team to an undefeated winning streak for the regular season. The program made it to the Mid-South Conference finals where they were defeated 1-0 by rival, Lindsay Wilson College.
caption: Cumberland University
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