Missouri Valley Conference

The Missouri Valley Conference (also called MVC or simply "The Valley") is the second-oldest college athletic conference in the United States. Currently, its members are located in the midwestern United States. The conference participates in the NCAA's Division I.

Founded in 1907 as the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MVIAA), the only college conference that is older is the Big Ten. However, some consider the MVC to have been formed from a split of the MVIAA in 1928. Most of the larger MVIAA schools formed a conference that retained the MVIAA name and would ultimately become the Big Eight Conference. The smaller schools, plus Oklahoma A&M (now Oklahoma State University, which ultimately joined the Big Eight in 1957), formed the MVC. During the Big Eight's existence, both conferences claimed 1907 as their founding date, as well as the same history through 1927. It was never definitively established which conference was the original and which was the spin-off, but given that the Big Eight self-terminated in 1996, only the MVC continues to have a claim to the original heritage.

During the 2006–2007 college basketball season, MVC teams held a 74–27 non-conference record, including a record of 44–1 at home. The Valley finished in the Top 6 of the RPI and ahead of a BCS conference for the second consecutive year, while also garnering multiple NCAA bids for the ninth straight year and 12th of 14.

The MVC has not sponsored football since 1985, when it was classified as a I-A (now FBS) conference, but five members have football programs in the Missouri Valley Football Conference (known as the Gateway from 1985–2008) of Division I FCS (formerly I-AA), and a sixth competes in another FCS conference, the Pioneer Football League. The Missouri Valley Conference shares its name with the Missouri Valley Football Conference, and the two also operate from the same headquarters complex in St. Louis. However, the two are separate administratively.