The Southern–New Orleans Knights and Lady Knights are the athletic teams that represent

Southern University at New Orleans Southern University at New Orleans (also known as SUNO) is a public historically black university in New Orleans, Louisiana. It is a member of the Southern University System and the Thurgood Marshall College Fund. History Southern Univer ...

, located in

New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

, in intercollegiate sports as a member of the

National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) established in 1940, is a college athletics association for higher education, colleges and universities in North America. Most colleges and universities in the NAIA offer athletic schola ...

(NAIA), primarily competing in the

Gulf Coast Athletic Conference The HBCU Athletic Conference (HBCUAC), formerly known as the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, is a college athletic conference made up entirely of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) that is affiliated with the National Asso ...

(GCAC) since the 2022–23 academic year; which they were a member on a previous stint from 1986–87 to 2018–19 (their final season before the school suspended its athletics program and eventually re-instating it back). The university has garnered over 150 NAIA All-American honors in its athletic programs.

Return

On January 20, 2022, SUNO re-instated its athletic program and received an invitation to re-join back to the GCAC, along with

Oakwood University Oakwood University is a private, historically black Seventh-day Adventist university in Huntsville, Alabama. It is the only HBCU owned and operated by the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Oakwood University is accredited by the Southern Assoc ...

(from the

United States Collegiate Athletic Association The United States Collegiate Athletic Association (USCAA) is a national organization for the intercollegiate athletic programs of 72 mostly small colleges, including community/junior colleges, across the United States. The USCAA holds 15 national ...

(USCAA)) and

Wiley College Wiley University (formerly Wiley College) is a private historically black college in Marshall, Texas. Founded in 1873 by the Methodist Episcopal Church's Bishop Isaac Wiley and certified in 1882 by the Freedman's Aid Society, it is one of the ...

, effective beginning in July 2022.

Sports sponsored

SUNO competes in four intercollegiate varsity sports: Men's sports included baseball and basketball; while women's sports included basketball and volleyball.

Baseball

The Southern–New Orleans Knights baseball team represents Southern University at New Orleans in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. The school's team currently competes in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, which is part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. The team plays its home games at 650-seat Wesley Barrow Stadium. Baseball was added to the athletics program for the first time in 2024.

Basketball

Men's basketball

The Southern–New Orleans Knights men's basketball team represents Southern University at New Orleans in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. The school's team currently competes in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, which is part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. The team plays its home games at the 1,200-seat Health and Physical Education Building also known as "The Castle". SUNO's men basketball teams have appeared in six NAIA tournaments.

Women's basketball

The Southern–New Orleans Lady Knights women's basketball team represents Southern University at New Orleans in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. The school's team currently competes in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, which is part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. The team plays its home games at the 1,200-seat Health and Physical Education Building also known as "The Castle". The women's basketball team has appeared in one NAIA Tournament.

Women's volleyball

The Southern–New Orleans Lady Knights women's volleyball team represents Southern University at New Orleans in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. The school's team currently competes in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, which is part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. The team plays its home matches at the 1,200-seat Health and Physical Education Building also known as "The Castle".

Former varsity sports

Men's and women's track and field

The Southern–New Orleans Knights and Lady Knights track and field teams represented Southern University at New Orleans in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. The school's teams competed in outdoor track and field in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, which is part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. The men's track & field team placed 2nd in nation at the NCAA Division III outdoor championships in 1974 and at the NAIA outdoor national outdoor championships in 1998. Former head coach Dr. Artis Davenport was named NAIA Women's Indoor and Outdoor as well as Men's Outdoor Track & Field Coach of the Year in 1995. He earned the same honor in 1997 for Indoor Track & Field. The track and field team garnered 6 NAIA All-American honors at the NAIA 2008 Indoor Track & Field Championships. Two Olympians have competed in SUNO's Track & Field Program. They include Savatheda Fynes (

Bahamas The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of its population. ...

) and Julius Achon (

Uganda Uganda, officially the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the ...

Championships

Southern–New Orleans holds five national championships between

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

Division III and NAIA.

Athletic facilities

Current facilities

*Health and Physical Education Building
The Health and Physical Education Building nicknamed The Castle, is the 1,200-seat arena for the men's and women's basketball teams and women's volleyball team. It opened in 1974. *Wesley Barrow Stadium
Wesley Barrow Stadium is a 650-seat

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

and

softball Softball is a Variations of baseball, variation of baseball, the difference being that it is played with a larger ball, on a smaller field, and with only underhand pitches (where the ball is released while the hand is primarily below the ball) ...

stadium located in the

Pontchartrain Park Pontchartrain Park is a historically registered New Orleans neighborhoods, neighborhood of the city of New Orleans, Louisiana, New Orleans. A subdistrict of the Gentilly, New Orleans, Gentilly District Area, its boundaries as defined by the City ...

section of

. Named in memory of

Negro league baseball The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be used narrowly for the seven relativel ...

manager Management (or managing) is the administration of organizations, whether businesses, nonprofit organizations, or a government bodies through business administration, nonprofit management, or the political science sub-field of public administra ...

Wesley Barrow, a longtime prominent figure in the New Orleans baseball community, the stadium includes a 200-square-foot climate-controlled press box, a public address system and LED scoreboard. The baseball field features professional-sized artificial turf with a clay pitcher's mound and two fenced bullpens.

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Southern-New Orleans Knights and Lady Knights