Established April 4, 2011 Division Division III Sports fielded 1 | Association NCAA Members 8 Headquarters Madison, New Jersey | |
The Continental Volleyball Conference is an intercollegiate men's volleyball conference associated with the NCAA's Division III.
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History
On April 4, 2011 Gary Williams, Associate Athletic Director of Carthage College announced in Milwaukee the formation of the Continental Volleyball Conference. The league was established as a direct result of the launch of the NCAA Men's Division III Volleyball Championship in the next school year of 2011–12, with the inaugural tournament to take place in April 2012.
With the continued growth of Division III men's volleyball, the CVC announced in March 2014 that it would split into two leagues after the 2014 season. The league's six Eastern members retained the CVC name and branding, while the six Midwestern members, plus two other Midwestern schools that had been announced as incoming CVC members, formed a new men's volleyball conference that was later unveiled as the Midwest Collegiate Volleyball League (MCVL). When the split was announced, the eastern members also added Rutgers–Newark, a Division III school which had previously played at the National Collegiate (Division I/II) level as a "grandfathered" scholarship-granting program, for the 2015 season.
The conference added the newly launched men's volleyball program of Alvernia as its eighth member for the 2017 season.
Further membership changes were announced in 2016. First, on October 12, the Middle Atlantic Conferences, whose Commonwealth Conference was the all-sports home of charter CVC member Stevenson and new CVC member Alvernia, announced that they would begin sponsoring men's volleyball in the 2018 season, leading to the impending departure of those schools from the CVC. Within a week of this development, the CVC announced that Kean, Neumann, and Southern Virginia would become new members for the 2018 season, and that Thiel would leave after that same season. Then, on November 21, Ramapo was announced as an incoming member for the 2018 season.
Current members
The league currently has eight full members, with two members set to leave after the 2017 season, four schools set to join for the 2018 season, and one member departing after the 2018 season. Departing members are highlighted in red.
Note that because NCAA men's volleyball is a spring sport, the year of joining is the calendar year before the first year of competition.
Former members
In addition to the above schools, two other institutions that were adding men's volleyball for the 2014–15 school year (2015 season)—Benedictine University in Illinois and Loras College in Iowa—had been announced as new CVC members. They never officially joined the CVC, instead uniting with the six Midwestern CVC schools in the MCVL.
Membership timeline
As noted previously, the year of joining is the calendar year before the first season of competition.