The Summit League, or The Summit, is an NCAA Division I intercollegiate athletic conference with its membership mostly located in the Midwestern United States, from Minnesota in the east, to the Dakotas, Nebraska and Colorado to the West, and Missouri and Oklahoma to the South. Founded as the Association of Mid-Continent Universities in 1982, it rebranded as the Mid-Continent Conference in 1989, then again as the Summit League on June 1, 2007. The league headquarters are in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
The North Dakota Fighting Hawks are the athletic teams that represent the University of North Dakota (UND), located in the city of Grand Forks, North Dakota. The Fighting Hawks compete at the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I level as a member of the Summit League. With 17 varsity teams, North Dakota is best known for its Ice Hockey team and American Football team. North Dakota's main rivalries are with the North Dakota State Bison and the Minnesota Golden Gophers.
The North Dakota Fighting Hawks men's ice hockey team is the college ice hockey team of the University of North Dakota. They are members of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC) and compete in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I ice hockey. North Dakota is widely regarded as a premier college hockey school and has one of the most storied programs in NCAA history. UND has made over 30 appearances in the NCAA tournament, appeared in the Frozen Four 22 times, and has won 8 NCAA Division I Championships. The program has also achieved 15 WCHA Regular season Championships, 5 NCHC Regular season Championships, and 12 Conference Tournament championships. The school's former nickname was the Fighting Sioux, which had a lengthy and controversial tenure before ultimately being retired by the university in 2012 due to pressure from the NCAA. The official school nickname is now the Fighting Hawks, a name that was chosen by the university on November 18, 2015.
The North Dakota State Bison men's basketball team is a part of the athletic program at North Dakota State University in Fargo, North Dakota, U.S. They are members of the NCAA Division I and have been part of The Summit League since May 2007. Home games are played at the Scheels Center which is located on the NDSU campus in Fargo, ND. The team shares a conference rival with the South Dakota State Jackrabbits. The Bison men's head coach is David Richman. On March 10, 2009 the Bison made their biggest comeback in school history with a 66–64 win over Oakland University to win the Summit League tournament championship and became the first team since Southwestern Louisiana in 1972 to advance to the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship in their first year of eligibility.
The East Coast Conference was a college athletic conference at the Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). It was founded as the university division of the Middle Atlantic Conferences (MAC) in 1958. The MAC consisted of over 30 teams at that time, making it impossible to organize full league schedules in sports like football, basketball, and baseball. In 1958, the larger schools created their own mini conference, consisting of 11 members.
The Nickel Trophy is a trophy that was presented to the winner of the annual football game between the rival University of North Dakota (UND) Fighting Hawks and the North Dakota State University (NDSU) Bison. The two universities are approximately 76 miles apart on the eastern border of North Dakota. The two schools suspended play in 2003 before meeting again in 2015, with annual games resuming in 2019. In the entire history of the rivalry, the game has never been contested anywhere beside Grand Forks or Fargo.
Donald D. Maestri Jr. is an American college basketball coach who was the head men's basketball coach at Troy University from 1982 to 2013. Prior to accepting this position, Maestri was an assistant coach at Mississippi State University from 1979 to 1980 and at the University of Alabama from 1980 to 1982. Maestri coached the Trojans to a record of 500–404, one NCAA basketball tournament, five regular season conference titles, and one conference tournament title over the course of 26 seasons at Troy. He has been named coach of the year in the East Coast Conference (1994), the Summit League, Atlantic Sun Conference and the Sun Belt Conference (2009)
The Summit League women's basketball tournament has existed since 1993. The winner of the tournament receives the Summit League's automatic bid into the NCAA Women's Division I Basketball Championship.
The Boise State Broncos men's basketball team represents Boise State University in the Mountain West Conference. The Broncos are led by head coach Leon Rice, hired in March 2010, and play their home games on campus at ExtraMile Arena in Boise, Idaho. BSU's most recent appearance in the NCAA tournament was in 2024.
The Northern State Wolves are the athletic teams that represent Northern State University, located in Aberdeen, South Dakota, U.S., in NCAA Division II intercollegiate sports. The Wolves compete as members of the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference for all 13 varsity sports. Northern State has been a member of the conference since 1978, and they also have the fifth-smallest enrollment of the 16 member schools. In the 1990s, all members of the NSIC solely became members of NCAA Division II, after spending many years with dual membership with the NAIA.
Gregory A. Lansing is a current special assistant to the head coach at Arizona State. An assistant and head coach at the high school and college levels since 1990, he was most recently the head men's basketball coach at Indiana State University from 2010 to 2021, having twice previously been an assistant coach at Indiana State.
The North Dakota Fighting Sioux women's basketball team is part of the athletic program at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks, North Dakota. It is a member of the NCAA Division I Summit League; the 2019–2020 season was their first in the new conference. Previously they played in Division I's Big Sky Conference and Division I's Great West Conference.
The 1990 NCAA Division II men's basketball tournament involved 32 schools playing in a single-elimination tournament to determine the national champion of men's NCAA Division II college basketball as a culmination of the 1989-90 NCAA Division II men's basketball season. It was won by Kentucky Wesleyan College, with Wade Green of runner-up California State University, Bakersfield named the Most Outstanding Player.
The 2015–16 North Dakota Fighting Hawks women's basketball team represents the University of North Dakota during the 2015–16 NCAA Division I women's basketball season. The Fighting Hawks, led by fourth year head coach Travis Brewster and play their home games at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center. They were members of the Big Sky Conference. They finished the season 19–14, 13–5 in Big Sky play to finish in a 3 way tie for second place. They advanced to the semifinals of the Big Sky women's tournament where they lost to Idaho State. They were invited to the Women's Basketball Invitational where defeated New Mexico in the first round before losing in the quarterfinals to Big Sky member Weber State.
The 2017 Big Sky Conference men's basketball tournament was the 42nd edition of the postseason tournament for the Big Sky Conference, held March 7–11 at the Reno Events Center in Reno, Nevada.
The 2017–18 North Dakota Fighting Hawks men's basketball team represented the University of North Dakota during the 2017–18 NCAA Division I men's basketball season. The Fighting Hawks, led by 12th-year head coach Brian Jones, played their home games at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center in Grand Forks, North Dakota as members of the Big Sky Conference. They finished the season 12–20, 6–12 in Big Sky play to finish in a tie for eighth place. They defeated Montana State in the first round of the Big Sky tournament before losing in the quarterfinals to Montana.
The 2017–18 North Dakota Fighting Hawks women's basketball team represents the University of North Dakota during the 2017–18 NCAA Division I women's basketball season. The Fighting Hawks were led by sixth year head coach Travis Brewster and play their home games at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center. They were members of the Big Sky Conference. They finished the season 12–18, 5–13 in Big Sky play to finish in a tie for ninth place. They lost in the first round of the Big Sky women's tournament to Montana State.
The 2018–19 North Dakota Fighting Hawks women's basketball team represents the University of North Dakota during the 2018–19 NCAA Division I women's basketball season. The Fighting Hawks were led by seventh year head coach Travis Brewster and play their home games at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center. They were first year members of the Summit League. They finished the season 12–19, 6–10 in Summit League play to finish in sixth place. They advanced to the semifinals of the Summit League women's tournament where they lost to South Dakota.
Paul Sather is an American college basketball coach, currently head men's basketball coach at the University of North Dakota.
The 2021–22 North Dakota Fighting Hawks basketball team represented the University of North Dakota in the 2021–22 NCAA Division I men's basketball season. The Fighting Hawks were led by third-year head coach Paul Sather and played their home games at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center in Grand Forks, North Dakota, as members of the Summit League.
