TheSkyline Conference was acollege athletic conference based in theWestern United States that was active from December 1937 to June 1962. The conference's formal name was theMountain States Athletic Conference, although it was also known as theMountain States Conference along with informal but popular nicknames. It is unrelated to the contemporarySkyline Conference that is active inNCAA Division III in theNew York City area.
The conference began operating on December 3, 1937, when most of the larger schools in theRocky Mountain Conference left to form a new conference.[1] The seven charter members of the conference were:BYU,Colorado, Colorado A&M (nowColorado State),Denver,Utah,Utah State, andWyoming.[1] At the time of formation, the formal name ofMountain States Athletic Conference was adopted,[2] although newspapers were already calling it theBig Seven at that time.[3] The conference became popularly known as the Skyline Conference orSkyline Six after Colorado left in 1947.[4] Colorado joined theMissouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MVIAA), informally known as the Big Six Conference, which took over the Big Seven name and would later become theBig Eight Conference.
The conference became known as theSkyline Eight afterNew Mexico andMontana joined in 1951.[5] The conference officially dissolved as of July 1, 1962, after four of its members (BYU, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming) departed to form theWestern Athletic Conference (WAC).[6] Montana operated as anindependent for one football season in 1962 until the formation of theBig Sky Conference in 1963. Colorado State became independent until it joined the WAC in 1968. Utah State operated as an independent for fifteen seasons, until it joined the Pacific Coast Athletic Association (later named theBig West Conference) in 1977.
^Montana joined the Mountain States after a year of independent play during the 1950–51 school year following several decades of membership in thePacific Coast Conference (PCC).
