22 Schools•Division I•Est. 1979
The Coastal Athletic Association began as the ECAC South Conference, a basketball league of independent East Coast schools, and expanded into a full multisport conference under the name Colonial Athletic Association in 1985. It adopted its current name in 2023. The league brings together universities along the East Coast corridor between New England and the Carolinas, most of them public, and has built its identity around competing at a championship level while holding to academic standards. The CAA Academic Alliance, created in 2002 by the league's presidents, extended that partnership beyond the playing field into shared academic resources and leadership development.
Basketball made the national reputation. George Mason reached the Final Four in 2006, and VCU followed in 2011 as the first team to win five games in a single NCAA tournament run. Old Dominion, James Madison, UNC Wilmington, Charleston, Northeastern, Hofstra, Drexel and Delaware have all claimed conference tournament crowns. On the women's side Old Dominion assembled one of the sport's great runs, with James Madison, Drexel, Delaware, Elon, Towson, Monmouth, William & Mary and Charleston adding titles of their own.
Football has its own lineage, tracing back through the Atlantic 10 to the Yankee Conference, whose code took effect in 1946. Programs under the CAA Football banner have won FCS national championships, and Delaware quarterback Joe Flacco went eighteenth overall in the 2008 NFL Draft before earning Super Bowl MVP honors.
The Olympic tradition is genuine. Northeastern's Kendall Coyne Schofield won ice hockey gold in 2018 and silver in 2014 and 2022. George Mason's Greg Haughton took two bronze medals in Sydney, Istvan Bagyula vaulted in Barcelona, and Julius Achon and William & Mary's Brian Hyde ran in Atlanta.
Rivalries give the schedule its edge. Hampton and North Carolina A&T carried a long HBCU rivalry into the league. Hampton and William & Mary share the Virginia Peninsula. Northeastern and Hofstra have played for the Frank Barone Trophy.
Official Website
The Coastal Athletic Association began as the ECAC South Conference, a basketball league of independent East Coast schools, and expanded into a full multisport conference under the name Colonial Athletic Association in 1985. It adopted its current name in 2023. The league brings together universities along the East Coast corridor between New England and the Carolinas, most of them public, and has built its identity around competing at a championship level while holding to academic standards. The CAA Academic Alliance, created in 2002 by the league's presidents, extended that partnership beyond the playing field into shared academic resources and leadership development.
Basketball made the national reputation. George Mason reached the Final Four in 2006, and VCU followed in 2011 as the first team to win five games in a single NCAA tournament run. Old Dominion, James Madison, UNC Wilmington, Charleston, Northeastern, Hofstra, Drexel and Delaware have all claimed conference tournament crowns. On the women's side Old Dominion assembled one of the sport's great runs, with James Madison, Drexel, Delaware, Elon, Towson, Monmouth, William & Mary and Charleston adding titles of their own.
Football has its own lineage, tracing back through the Atlantic 10 to the Yankee Conference, whose code took effect in 1946. Programs under the CAA Football banner have won FCS national championships, and Delaware quarterback Joe Flacco went eighteenth overall in the 2008 NFL Draft before earning Super Bowl MVP honors.
The Olympic tradition is genuine. Northeastern's Kendall Coyne Schofield won ice hockey gold in 2018 and silver in 2014 and 2022. George Mason's Greg Haughton took two bronze medals in Sydney, Istvan Bagyula vaulted in Barcelona, and Julius Achon and William & Mary's Brian Hyde ran in Atlanta.
Rivalries give the schedule its edge. Hampton and North Carolina A&T carried a long HBCU rivalry into the league. Hampton and William & Mary share the Virginia Peninsula. Northeastern and Hofstra have played for the Frank Barone Trophy.
Official Website