Northwest Conference

Association	NCAA
Founded	December 12, 1925[1]
Commissioner	Shana Levine
Sports fielded	20 men's: 9 women's: 11
Division	Division III
No. of teams	9
Headquarters	Hillsboro, Oregon
Region	Pacific Northwest
Official website	nwcsports.com
Locations

TheNorthwest Conference (NWC) is anintercollegiate athletic conference which competes in theNCAA'sDivision III. Member teams are located in the states ofOregon andWashington. It was known as thePacific Northwest Conference from 1926 to 1984.

Northwest Conference

100km
62miles

Willamette

Whitworth

Whitman

Puget Sound

Pacific Lutheran

Pacific

Linfield

Lewis & Clark

George Fox

   

The Northwest Conference was formed in 1925,^[1] making it one of the oldest continuously existing athletics conferences in the western United States. For 60 years, the NWC sponsored sports exclusively for men, but in 1984 it joined with the Women's Conference of Independent Colleges to become the Northwest Conference of Independent Colleges, shortening the name to its current moniker in 1996 when it joined the NCAA.

The charter members includedWillamette University,Pacific University,Whitman College, the College of Puget Sound (now theUniversity of Puget Sound), Linfield College (nowLinfield University), and theCollege of Idaho. In 1931, Albany College joined, left in 1938, and re-joined in 1949 using its present name ofLewis & Clark College.Pacific Lutheran University was added in 1965, andWhitworth University in 1970. In 1978, the College of Idaho dropped out of the conference. Whitworth also left in 1984, but then returned in 1988. In 1996,George Fox University joined when the conference moved to the NCAA and Puget Sound re-joined in that same year since 1948. From 2006 to 2010,Menlo College was also a part of the conference as an associate member in football.

The College of Idaho reinstated its football program in 2014 after a 37-year hiatus^[2] and joined theFrontier Conference for football. College of Idaho is now a member of the NAIA'sCascade Collegiate Conference for other sports. Whitworth left the NWC in 1984 but returned in 1988.George Fox University andSeattle University joined the conference in 1997. Seattle dropped out again in 1999 to become members of NCAA Division II.^[3]Menlo College joined the conference in 2005 as a football-only member.

• 1925 – The NWC was founded as the Pacific Northwest Conference (PNWC). Charter members include theCollege of Idaho, Linfield College (nowLinfield University),Pacific University, theCollege of Puget Sound (now the University of Puget Sound),Whitman College andWillamette University, beginning the 1926–27 academic year.^[1]
• 1931 –Albany College (now Lewis & Clark College) joined the PNWC in the 1931–32 academic year.
• 1938 – Lewis & Clark left the PNWC after the 1937–38 academic year.
• 1948 – Puget Sound left the PNWC after the 1947–48 academic year.
• 1949 – Lewis & Clark re-joined back to the PNWC in the 1949–50 academic year.
• 1965 –Pacific Lutheran College (now Pacific Lutheran University) joined the PNWC in the 1965–66 academic year.
• 1970 –Whitworth College (now Whitworth University) joined the PNWC in the 1970–71 academic year.
• 1978 – The College of Idaho left the PNWC after the 1977–78 academic year.
• 1984 – Whitworth left the PNWC after the 1983–84 academic year.
• 1984 – The PNWC merged with theWomen's Conference of Independent Colleges (WCIC) to become the Northwest Conference of Independent Colleges (NCIC), therefore adding women's sports in the conference, beginning the 1984–85 academic year.
• 1988 – Whitworth re-joined back to the NCIC in the 1988–89 academic year.
• 1995 –George Fox College (now George Fox University) joined the NCIC in the 1995–96 academic year.
• 1996 – Puget Sound re-joined back to the NCIC in the 1996–97 academic year.
• 1996 – The NCIC has rebranded its name to become the Northwest Conference (NWC), beginning the 1996–97 academic year.
• 1996 – The NWC has joined full membership in theDivision III ranks of theNational Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) after years spent in theNational Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), beginning the 1996–97 academic year.
• 1997 –Seattle University joined the NWC in the 1997–98 academic year.
• 1999 – Seattle left the NWC to join theNCAA Division II ranks and thePacific West Conference (PacWest) after the 1998–99 academic year.
• 2006 –Menlo College joined the NWC as an associate member for football in the 2006 fall season (2006–07 academic year).
• 2011 – Menlo left the NWC as an associate member for football after the 2010 fall season (2010–11 academic year).
• 2018 –Mills College joined the NWC as an associate member for women's rowing for the 20178 spring season (2017-18 academic year)
• 2022 - Mills left the NWC as an associate member for women's rowing as the school merged withNortheastern University and put their athletics programs on hold

The NWC currently has nine full members, all areprivate schools:

Notes

The NWC had two former full members, which both wereprivate schools:

Notes

The NWC had two former associate members, which were also aprivate school:

Notes

The Northwest Conference sponsors championship competition in nine men's and 11 women's NCAA sanctioned sports.^[12]

Each year the NWC awards one of its member institutions the NWC McIlroy-Lewis All-Sports Trophy, based on a points system. The award is named in honor of Jane McIlroy, former athletic director of Linfield (1950-82), and John Lewis of Willamette (1947-72).

In each sport, the conference champion is awarded 18 points, second place is awarded 16 points, and so on. The school with the most points at the conclusion of the academic year wins the trophy. Football, women's volleyball, men's and women's cross country, men's and women's soccer, men's and women's swimming, men's and women's basketball, men's and women's tennis, men's and women's golf, men's baseball, women's softball, and men's and women's track and field are the 18 sports in which points are awarded.

Pacific Lutheran has won the award 15 times, more than any other school. Whitworth has won the trophy 14 times, Linfield has won the trophy three times while Puget Sound and George Fox have won it twice.^[13][14]

† - Whitworth was not a member of the NWC until 1970.

• Official website

• Northwest Conference

• Pages using the EasyTimeline extension
• CS1 location test
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles containing OSM location maps
• Pages using the Kartographer extension