North Carolina A&T is departing the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, the school announced on Friday.
The Aggies will join the Big South Conference on July 1, 2021 and become that conference’s 12th full-time member school. NC A&T will immediately be eligible for Big South conference championships upon entering the conference’s ranks.
A founding member school in the MEAC, the Aggies have been part of the conference since 1970 and were one of four schools to have an uninterrupted tenure in conference membership since the league’s inception.
“”We have been looking carefully at our opportunities in athletics for five years and more intensively over the past year,” North Carolina A&T chancellor Harold L. Martin Sr. said in a school statement. “We’re pleased to have brought that process to fruition and excited to be ushering in a new alliance with the Big South. This move makes great sense for our student-athletes, for our fans and for our bottom line. We will always have a place in our hearts for the MEAC, and we look forward to what the new conference will make possible for the Aggies.”
Hampton left the MEAC to join the Big South in 2018 and, along with North Carolina A&T, will be the only two HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges & Universities) as Big South member schools. The league also lost Savannah State last year, when the Tigers dropped to Division II.
The NC A&T softball program finished the 2019 season with a 9-31 overall record and a 5-10 mark in MEAC play. The program made a coaching change over the summer, hiring former Elon head coach Patti Raduenz as the new head coach.
