Chicago Maroons


The Chicago Maroons are the intercollegiate sports teams of the University of Chicago. They are named after the color maroon. Team colors are maroon and gray, and Phil the Phoenix is their mascot. They now compete in the NCAA Division III, mostly as members of the University Athletic Association.
The University of Chicago helped found the Big Ten Conference in 1895; although it dropped football in 1939, its other teams remained members until 1946. Football returned as a club sport in 1963, as a varsity sport in 1969, and began competing independently in Division III in 1973. The school was part of the Midwest Collegiate Athletic Conference from 1976 to 1987, and its football team joined the Midwest Collegiate Athletic Conference's successor, the Midwest Conference, in 2017. In the 2018–19 school year, Chicago added baseball to its MWC membership, and elevated its club team in women's lacrosse to full varsity status, with that sport competing in the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin.
Stagg Field is the home stadium for the re-instated football team.

Conference affiliation

Big Ten Conference

The Maroons helped establish the Big Ten Conference at a follow-up meeting on February 8, 1896. The league initially consisted of Chicago, Purdue, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, and Northwestern.
Jay Berwanger was awarded the first Heisman trophy in 1935.
file:Chicago University and Waseda University Baseball Club players in 1915.jpg|thumb|Baseball team of 1915
Hall of Fame coach Amos Alonzo Stagg coached the football team from 1892 to 1932, the basketball team from 1920 to 1921, and the baseball team from 1893 to 1905 and 1907–1913. He encouraged players to adopt vegetarianism, believing it supported both athleticism and a "gentle and gentlemanly" sportsmanship.
The football team was dropped following the 1939 season. In explaining the reason to drop football, Robert Maynard Hutchins, the university's president, had written acidly in The Saturday Evening Post “In many colleges, it is possible for a boy to win 12 letters without learning how to write one.”
On March 7, 1946, the University of Chicago withdrew from the Big Ten Conference. On May 31, 1946, the resignation was formally accepted by the Big Ten Conference.

Varsity teams

Men's sportsWomen's sports
BaseballBasketball
BasketballCross country
Cross countryLacrosse
FootballSoccer
GolfSoftball
SoccerSwimming
SwimmingTennis
TennisTrack and field
Track and fieldVolleyball
Wrestling

Facilities

Current

VenueSportOpen.Ref.
Gerald Ratner Athletics CenterBasketball
Volleyball
Wrestling
Swimming		2003
Henry Crown Field HouseIndoor track and field
Racquetball
Handball
Basketball 		1932
Stagg FieldFootball
Soccer
Outdoor track and field		2013

Former

VenueSportOpen.Clos.Ref.
Men's GymnasiumBasketball18911904
Bartlett HallBasketball1904–

;Notes

Championships

National and NCAA championships

  • Basketball : 1906–07, 1907–08, and 1908–09
  • Football : 1905, 1913
  • Men's Gymnastics: 1938, 9 individual champions
  • Men's Soccer: 2022
  • Men's Tennis: 2022
  • Men's Track & Field : 7 individual champions
  • Kris Alden: 1989 Men's Swimming Individual Champion
  • Rhaina Echols: 1999 Women's Cross Country Individual Champion, 2000 Women's Indoor and 2000 Women's Outdoor Individual Track Champion
  • Tom Haxton: 2004 Men's Outdoor Track & Field Individual Champion
  • Adeoye Mabogunje: 2004 Men's Outdoor Track & Field Individual Champion
  • Peter Wang: 1991 & 1992 Wrestling Individual Champion
  • Liz Lawton: 2010 Women's Outdoor Track & Field Individual Champion
  • Michael Bennett: 2014 Men's Indoor Track & Field Individual Champion
  • Michelle Dobbs: 2016 Women's Indoor Track & Field Individual Champion
  • Khia Kurtenbach: 2017 Women's Cross Country Individual Champion

    University Athletic Association championships

  • Men's Basketball: 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2007, 2008
  • Women's Basketball: 1989, 2008, 2011, 2012
  • Men's Cross Country: 2002, 2004
  • Women's Cross Country: 1992, 1993, 2012, 2013, 2022
  • Football: 1998, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2014
  • Men's Soccer: 2001, 2009, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2022
  • Women's Soccer: 1994, 1996, 1999, 2010
  • Softball: 1996
  • Men's Track & Field : 2002, 2008
  • Women's Track & Field : 2008, 2010, 2014, 2015, 2018
  • Women's Track & Field : 2015
  • Wrestling: 1989, 1990, 1992, 1995, 1997, 1998, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011
  • Women's Tennis: 2010, 2012, 2022
  • Men's Tennis: 2018, 2022

    Midwest Conference championships

All championships listed here were won when the league was known as the Midwest Collegiate Athletic Conference, and only sponsored men's sports. The Midwest Conference was established in its current form in 1994 with the merger of the MCAC and Midwest Athletic Conference for Women.
  • Men's Soccer: 1978
  • Men's Tennis: 1984
  • Women's Tennis: 1983
  • Men's Track & Field : 1980
  • Women's Track & Field : 1983, 1984

    Big Ten Conference championships

  • Baseball: 1896, 1897, 1898, 1899, 1913
  • Men's Basketball: 1907, 1908, 1909, 1910, 1920, 1924
  • Men's Fencing: 1927–28, 1933–34, 1935–36, 1936–37, 1937–38, 1938–39, 1939–40, 1940–41
  • Football: 1899, 1905, 1907, 1908, 1913, 1922, 1924
  • Men's Golf: 1922, 1924, 1926
  • Men's Gymnastics: 1909, 1914, 1917, 1920, 1921, 1922, 1924, 1926, 1927, 1928, 1930, 1931, 1932, 1933, 1934
  • Men's Swimming: 1916, 1919, 1921
  • Men's Tennis: 1910, 1913, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1918, 1920, 1921, 1922, 1923, 1924, 1929, 1930, 1931, 1933, 1934, 1935, 1937, 1938, 1939
  • Men's Track & Field : 1911, 1915, 1917
  • Men's Track & Field : 1905, 1908, 1917

    Fight song

Wave the Flag is the fight song for the Maroons. Gordon Erickson wrote the lyrics in 1929. The tune was adapted from Miami University's "Marching Song" written in 1908 by Raymond H. Burke, a University of Chicago graduate who joined Miami's faculty in 1906.
The song is traditionally sung by the players at midfield after all home victories.