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College Athletic Conference Names Research

Inspired by the knowledge that Illinois State’s principal athletic affiliation, the Missouri Valley Conference, does not include a single member whose main campus is in the watershed of the Missouri River, Dr. Sublett decided to find out how the names of other US conferences of four-year colleges and universities match their member schools’ locations. He included NCAA, NAIA, USCAA, and a couple of independent conferences that cover multiple sports and those that deal with only one sport (like hockey or swimming). Eventually, he settled on 184 four-year conferences, of which 42 do not have a clear place basis in their names. Of the remaining 142 conferences, 91 had in 2019-2020 geographically accurate names (with respect to the main campus of each member school). The remaining 51 are the main focus of of his article, “Geographical Accuracy of Place-Based Collegiate Athletic Conference Names in the United States,” which appeared in Volume 68, Number 4 (December 2020) of Names: A Journal of Onomastics. ​​​

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