| Missouri Valley Football Conference | |
| Color: |
|
| Font Color: | white |
| Founded: | 1982 (chartered)[1] 1985 (began football) |
| Association: | NCAA |
| Division: | Division I |
| Subdivision: | FCS |
| Teams: | 11 (10 in 2025) |
| Sports: | 1 (football) |
| Mens: | 1 |
| Womens: | 0 |
| Region: | Midwest |
| Formerly: | Gateway Football Conference (1992–2008) Gateway Collegiate Athletic Conference (1982–1992) |
| Headquarters: | St. Louis, Missouri |
| Commissioner: | Patty Viverito |
| Since: | 1982 |
| Map: | Missouri Valley Football Conference Map.svg |
| Map Size: | 250 |
| Current Season: | 2024 Missouri Valley Football Conference season |
The Missouri Valley Football Conference (MVFC), formerly the Gateway Football Conference, is a collegiate athletic conference which operates in the Midwestern United States. It participates in the NCAA's Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) as a football-only conference.
The Missouri Valley Football Conference has a complex history that involves three other conferences:
In 1985, the MVC stopped sponsoring football. At that time, the two remaining I-AA members from the MVC (Illinois State and Southern Illinois) joined Eastern Illinois, Northern Iowa, Southwest Missouri State, and Western Illinois from the AMCU and together became a football conference under the Gateway's auspices.[3] Indiana State, which had left MVC football after the 1981 season to become a Division I-AA independent while remaining a full MVC member, would join the next year.[4]
In 1992, when the Gateway Collegiate Athletic Conference merged with the MVC,[1] the football conference kept the Gateway charter, with a minor name change to Gateway Football Conference. After Eastern Illinois joined the Ohio Valley Conference for football in 1996, Youngstown State joined in 1997 and was followed by Western Kentucky University in 2001. Southwest Missouri State changed its name to Missouri State in 2005.
Western Kentucky moved to the Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS; formerly Division I-A) after the 2006 season,[5] leaving the GFC with seven members for the 2007 season. Great West Football Conference members North Dakota State and South Dakota State[6] were invited to join the conference beginning with the 2008 season.[7] Subsequently, the Gateway Football Conference changed its name to the Missouri Valley Football Conference in June 2008. This change aligned the conference with the Missouri Valley Conference, a conference in which five of the nine Missouri Valley Football schools were (and still are) all-sports members. The conferences continue to share the "Missouri Valley" name, and space in the same building in St. Louis, but remain separate administratively.[8]
The University of South Dakota joined as the 10th member in 2012. The University of North Dakota joined as the 11th member in 2020, bringing back the yearly rivalries among North Dakota, North Dakota State, South Dakota and South Dakota State which had existed under the Division II North Central Conference that NDSU and SDSU left in 2004–05.[9] [10] [11]
On April 4, 2022, Murray State University, who had previously been announced as a new MVC member effective in July 2022, joined the MVFC in 2023, bringing the league up to a record high of 12 active members.[12] This was short-lived however, as on May 12, 2023, founding member Western Illinois announced that they would be leaving the MVFC and their full time conference, the Summit League, for the Ohio Valley Conference beginning in fall 2023 and 2024. They would leave the Summit beginning in fall 2023, and would leave the Valley after the conclusion of the 2023 football season.[13] Almost exactly a year after that, on May 10, 2024, fellow founding member Missouri State announced that they accepted an invitation to join Conference USA in all sports, beginning with the 2025-26 academic year.[14]
| Indiana State University | Terre Haute, Indiana | 1865 | 1986 | Public | 12,144 | $70.1 million | Sycamores | Missouri Valley | |
| Illinois State University | Normal, Illinois | 1857 | 1985 | 20,989 | $204 million | Redbirds | |||
| Missouri State University | Springfield, Missouri | 1905 | 1985 | Public | 23,502 | $193 million | Bears | Missouri Valley | |
| Murray State University | Murray, Kentucky | 1922 | 2023 | Public | 9,427 | $90.8 million | Racers | Missouri Valley | |
| Grand Forks, North Dakota | 1883 | 2020 | 14,172 | $352.1 million | Fighting Hawks | Summit | |||
| North Dakota State University | Fargo, North Dakota | 1890 | 2008 | 11,952 | $457 million | Bison | |||
| Cedar Falls, Iowa | 1876 | 1985 | 10,497 | $163 million | Panthers | Missouri Valley | |||
| Vermillion, South Dakota | 1862 | 2012 | 9,856 | $328.5 million | Coyotes | Summit | |||
| South Dakota State University | Brookings, South Dakota | 1881 | 2008 | 11,331 | $213 million | Jackrabbits | |||
| Southern Illinois University | Carbondale, Illinois | 1869 | 1985 | 11,366 | $190.1 million | Salukis | Missouri Valley | ||
| Youngstown State University | Youngstown, Ohio | 1908 | 1997 | 12,155 | $321.5 million | Penguins | Horizon |
| Institution | Location | Founded | Joined | Left | Type | Nickname | Colors | Primary conference during tenure in the MVFC | Current primary conference |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eastern Illinois University | Charleston, Illinois | 1895 | 1985 | 1995 | Public | Panthers | Summit | OVC | |
| Western Kentucky University | Bowling Green, Kentucky | 1906 | 2001 | 2007 | Hilltoppers | Sun Belt | C-USA | ||
| Western Illinois University | Macomb, Illinois | 1899 | 1985 | 2024 | Leathernecks | Summit | OVC |
DateFormat = yyyy
ImageSize = width:1000 height:auto barincrement:20
Period = from:1985 till:2027
TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal
PlotArea = right:20 left:0 bottom:50 top:5 #> to display a count on left side of graph, use "left:20" to suppress the count, use "left:20"<#
Colors = id:barcolor value:rgb(0.99,0.7,0.7)
id:line value:black
id:bg value:white id:Full value:rgb(0.742,0.727,0.852) # Use this color to denote a team that is a current member id:AssocF value:rgb(0.98,0.5,0.445) # Use this color to denote a team that is a former member id:AssocOS value:rgb(0.5,0.691,0.824) # Use this color to denote a team that is a member of two conferences for the same sport (consider identifying in legend or a footnote) id:OtherC1 value:rgb(0.996,0.996,0.699) # Use this color to denote a team that has moved to another conference id:OtherC2 value:rgb(0.988,0.703,0.383) # Use this color to denote a team that has moved to another conference where OtherC1 has already been used, to distinguish the twoPlotData=
width:15 textcolor:black shift:(5,-5) anchor:from fontsize:s
bar:1 color:AssocF from:1985 till:1996 text:Eastern Illinois (1985–1995)
bar:2 color:AssocOS from:1985 till:1986 text:Illinois State (1985, MVC; 1986–present) bar:2 color:Full from:1986 till:end
bar:3 color:Full from:1985 till:2005 text:Southwest Missouri State (1985–2025) bar:3 color:Full from:2005 till:2025 text:Missouri State
bar:4 color:Full from:1985 till:end text:Northern Iowa (1985–present)
bar:5 color:AssocOS from:1985 till:1986 text:Southern Illinois (1985, MVC; 1986–present) bar:5 color:Full from:1986 till:end
bar:6 color:AssocF from:1985 till:2024 text:Western Illinois (1985–2024)
bar:7 color:Full from:1986 till:end text:Indiana State (1986–present)
bar:8 color:Full from:1997 till:end text:Youngstown State (1997–present)
bar:9 color:AssocF from:2001 till:2007 text:Western Kentucky (2001–2007)
bar:10 color:Full from:2008 till:end text:North Dakota State (2008–present)
bar:11 color:Full from:2008 till:end text:South Dakota State (2008–present)
bar:12 color:Full from:2012 till:end text:South Dakota (2012–present)
bar:13 color:Full from:2020 till:end text:North Dakota (2020–present)
bar:14 shift:(-35) color:Full from:2023 till:end text:Murray State (2023–present)
bar:N color:powderblue from:1985 till:1992 text:Gateway Collegiate Athletic Conference bar:N color:yellow from:1992 till:2008 shift:35 text:Gateway Football Conference bar:N color:pink from:2008 till:end text:Missouri Valley Football Conference
ScaleMajor = gridcolor:line unit:year increment:2 start:1986
TextData = fontsize:L textcolor:black pos:(0,30) tabs:(400-center) text:^"MVFC membership history"
See also: List of Missouri Valley Football Conference champions. 11 different teams have won MVFC championships. The most recent champion is South Dakota State. The school with the most championships is Northern Iowa, with 16 (10 of them outright).
| Team | Titles | Title Years | Finals | Runner-up | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 | align=center | 10 | 2022 | ||
| 4 | 1991, 1993, 1994, 1997 | 7 | 1992, 1999, 2016 | ||
| 2 | 3 | 2020 | |||
| 1 | 1983 | 1 | |||
| Western Kentucky♯ | 1 | 1 | |||
| 0 | 1 | 2005 | |||
| 0 | 1 | 2014 |
| Team | Streak | Spoiler | Season(s) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | 39 † | Southern Illinois[15] | 2017–2020 | |
| 2. | North Dakota State | 33 | 2012–2014 | |
| 3. | 29 | Ongoing | 2022–present | |
| 4. | North Dakota State | 14 | 2015–2016 | |
| 5. | 13 | 2006–2007 | ||
| 13 | 2002–2003 |
| Hancock Stadium | 13,391 | ||
| Memorial Stadium | 12,764 | ||
| Plaster Sports Complex | 17,500 | ||
| Roy Stewart Stadium | 16,800 | ||
| Alerus Center | 12,283 | ||
| Fargodome | 18,700 | ||
| UNI-Dome | 16,324 | ||
| DakotaDome | 9,100 | ||
| 19,340 | |||
| Saluki Stadium | 15,000 | ||
| Stambaugh Stadium | 20,630 |