The Western Collegiate Athletic Association (WCAA) was a women's-only athletic conference on the

West Coast West Coast or west coast may refer to: Geography Australia * Western Australia *Regions of South Australia#Weather forecasting, West Coast of South Australia * West Coast, Tasmania **West Coast Range, mountain range in the region Canada * Britis ...

of the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. Members competed in the

Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women The Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) was founded in 1971 to govern collegiate women's athletics in the United States and to administer national championships (see AIAW Champions). It evolved out of the Commission on Interc ...

(AIAW) until the 1981–82 academic year, then the

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...

(NCAA). For its final year in 1985–86, the league was renamed Pacific West Conference; the

Pac-10 Conference The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate athletic conference, that operates in the Western United States, participating in 24 sports at the NCAA Division I level. Its football teams compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS; formerly Division ...

added women's sports in 1986 and the WCAA was retired.

Membership

Arizona Arizona ( ; nv, Hoozdo Hahoodzo ; ood, Alĭ ṣonak ) is a state in the Southwestern United States. It is the 6th largest and the 14th most populous of the 50 states. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix. Arizona is part of the Fou ...

Wildcats The wildcat is a species complex comprising two small wild cat species: the European wildcat (''Felis silvestris'') and the African wildcat (''F. lybica''). The European wildcat inhabits forests in Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus, while the ...

Arizona State Arizona State University (Arizona State or ASU) is a public research university in the Phoenix metropolitan area. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, ASU is one of the largest public universities by enrollment in the ...

Sun Devils *

Cal State Fullerton California State University, Fullerton (CSUF or Cal State Fullerton) is a public university in Fullerton, California. With a total enrollment of more than 41,000, it has the largest student body of the 23-campus California State University (CSU) ...

Titans In Greek mythology, the Titans ( grc, οἱ Τῑτᾶνες, ''hoi Tītânes'', , ''ho Tītân'') were the pre-Olympian gods. According to the ''Theogony'' of Hesiod, they were the twelve children of the primordial parents Uranus (Sky) and Ga ...

* Long Beach State 49ers *

San Diego State San Diego State University (SDSU) is a public research university in San Diego, California. Founded in 1897 as San Diego Normal School, it is the third-oldest university and southernmost in the 23-member California State University (CSU) system ...

Aztecs The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different Indigenous peoples of Mexico, ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those g ...

* Stanford Cardinal *

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

Bruins * USC

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History

The WCAA was founded in 1976 with seven charter members: UCLA, USC, Arizona, Arizona State, Cal State-Fullerton, Long Beach State, and San Diego State. These seven were among the premier programs in many women's sports and were previously independent. The men's teams at these schools competed in three leagues: Pacific-8, WAC, and PCAA. The seven WCAA schools represented the entirety of Division I

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

schools in southern

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

and

. The NCAA began sponsoring women's championships in the summer of 1981, and the WCAA moved from the AIAW to the NCAA. Stanford joined in 1982, and the WCAA had eight members for three years; the PCAA added women's sports in 1985, so Long Beach State and Cal State-Fullerton moved. San Diego State also joined the PCAA for women's sports only (the WAC did not sponsor women's sports until 1990; its parallel league was the "High Country Athletic Conference"). The remaining five members of the WCAA, all Pac-10 schools, competed in the renamed "PacWest Conference" for a final academic year (1985–86); the Pac-10 added women's sports in the summer of 1986. Its other five schools (

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

Washington State Washington (), officially the State of Washington, is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. Named for George Washington—the first U.S. president—the state was formed from the western part of the Washington ...

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

Oregon State Oregon State University (OSU) is a public land-grant, research university in Corvallis, Oregon. OSU offers more than 200 undergraduate-degree programs along with a variety of graduate and doctoral degrees. It has the 10th largest engineering col ...

, and

) had been members of the Northern Pacific Conference, which was also retired. Similarly in the west, the

Mountain West Athletic Conference The Mountain West Athletic Conference (MWAC) was a women's college athletic conference in the Western United States, western Launched in the summer of 1982, it existed for six years, until it was merged into the Big Sky Conference in 1988. Foun ...

(MWAC) was the women's league for the

Big Sky Conference The Big Sky Conference (BSC) is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with the NCAA's Division I with football competing in the Football Championship Subdivision. Member institutions are located in the western United States in the eig ...

until 1988.

AIAW and DGWS National Champions

Badminton

*Long Beach State: 1970, 74 *Arizona State: 1971, 75, 76, 78, 79, 80, 81 *UCLA: 1977

Basketball

*Cal State-Fullerton: 1970 *UCLA: 1978

Bowling

*Arizona State: 1981

Fencing

*Cal State-Fullerton: 1974

Field Hockey

*Long Beach State: 1978

Golf

*Cal State-Fullerton: 1967 (Individual) *Arizona State: 1969 (Individual), 70 (Individual), 75 (Team) *San Diego State: 1975 (Individual)

Gymnastics

*Cal State-Fullerton: 1979

Softball

*Arizona State: 1972, 73 *UCLA: 1978

Swimming & Diving

*Arizona State: 1968, 69, 70, 71, 73, 74, 77, 78

Synchronized Swimming

*Arizona: 1980, 81

Tennis

*Arizona State: 1971, 72, 74 *USC: 1977, 79, 80 *UCLA: 1981

Outdoor Track & Field

*UCLA: 1975, 77

Volleyball

*UCLA: 1971, 74, 75 *Long Beach State: 1972, 73 *USC: 1976, 77, 80

NCAA National Champions

*USC Basketball: 1983, 84 *UCLA Outdoor Track & Field: 1982, 83 *UCLA Softball: 1982, 84, 85 *Cal State-Fullerton softball: 1986 *Stanford Swimming & Diving: 1983 *Stanford tennis: 1982, 84, 86, 87 *USC tennis: 1983, 85 *USC volleyball: 1981 *UCLA volleyball: 1984

References

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