List of William & Mary Tribe football seasons

The William & Mary Tribe college football team competes in the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (formerly known as Division I-AA), representing the College of William & Mary in the Coastal Athletic Association (CAA) Football Conference. William & Mary has played its home games at Zable Stadium in Williamsburg, Virginia since 1935.^[1]

William & Mary fielded its first intercollegiate football team during the 1893 season.^[2] Between 1896 and 1908 the team's nickname was "Orange and White", derived from the school's former colors (William & Mary now uses green and gold).^[3] Since white uniforms dirtied too quickly, they became known as the "Orange and Black" from 1910 through 1916.^[3] Between 1917 and 1977 they were known as the Indians, and throughout this period a man dressing up as a Native American would ride around on a pony along the sidelines during games.^[3] This practice was discontinued when the outcry of stereotyping Native Americans as well as the use of a live animal became controversial.^[3] Since the 1978 season William & Mary has adopted the nickname "Tribe."^[3]

Throughout its history, William & Mary has been a member of seven different athletic conferences.^[4] Three of these—the South Atlantic Intercollegiate Athletic Association, Virginia Conference and Yankee Conference—are now defunct.^[5][6][7] The Tribe's membership as a Southern Conference school is its longest tenure with one conference; they had a 40-year membership between 1936 and 1976.^[4] William & Mary's current league, the Coastal Athletic Association Football Conference (CAA), has only been a football conference since 2007 (it was known as the Colonial Athletic Association from 2007 through 2022, then rebranded in July 2023).^[8] The CAA began competing in football as a result of the Atlantic 10 Conference's disbanding of the sport following the 2006 season. The A-10's remaining football schools joined the CAA football conference to continue competing in the sport. For all intents and purposes, including the conference's automatic bid to the FCS playoffs, the A-10 football conference became the present-day CAA football conference.

Through the 2023 season, William & Mary has earned 13 I-AA/FCS playoff berths.^[9] In two of these years (1988 and 1992) the Tribe has declined the bid, opting instead to play in the Epson Ivy Bowl, which was a short-lived college football bowl game played in Japan against a team composed of Japanese all-stars.^[9][10] The Epson Ivy Bowl is not recognized by the NCAA as an official game and therefore does not count towards official win–loss records. In the playoffs, William & Mary has reached the national semifinals two times (2004 and 2009), and in each of those seasons won a program record 11 wins.^[11][12] Previously in the Tribe's history they have also earned three postseason bowl game appearances, compiling one win and two losses.^[9] There have also been 18 conference championships and one division championship; five of the conference titles and the lone division title were won under head coach Jimmye Laycock, who was the head coach from 1980 through 2018.^[13][14]

Seasons

Notes

References

General

• "All-Time Results". William & Mary Tribe Football. August 2022. Retrieved December 10, 2022.

Specific

This page was last edited on 19 November 2023, at 19:38