Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference

The Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference (NSIC) is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division II level, which operates in the Upper Midwest of the United States. Nine of its members are in Minnesota, with three members in South Dakota, two members in North Dakota, and one member in Nebraska. It was founded in 1932. With the recent NSIC expansion, the original six member schools have been reunited. The conference sponsors 18 sports; ten for women and eight for men. Both men and women compete in basketball, cross country, golf, and indoor and outdoor track and field. Men compete in baseball, football, and wrestling. Women compete in soccer, softball, swimming & diving, tennis, and volleyball. The NSIC is the only Division II conference that sponsors soccer for women but not men (two other D-II conferences do not sponsor soccer for either sex). History The Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference was founded in 1932 as the Northern Teachers Athletic Conference. Charter members included Bemidji State Teachers College (Bemidji State University), Duluth State Teachers College (University of Minnesota Duluth), Mankato State Teachers College (Minnesota State University, Mankato), Moorhead State Teachers College (Minnesota State University Moorhead), St. Cloud State Teachers College (St. Cloud State University), and Winona State Teachers College (Winona State University). In 1942 the conference name was changed to the State Teacher's College Conference of Minnesota. The conference switched its name to the Northern Intercollegiate Conference (NIC) in 1962. In the spring of 1992 the NSIC was formed out of the merger of the NIC, the men's conference, and the women's Northern Sun Conference (NSC).