In December 1970, representatives from the seven founding schools gathered to lay the groundwork for a new conference. South Carolina State, though not a member of the CIAA, joined the discussions, bringing its independent athletic program into the fold. The Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference was officially established in 1970, with its headquarters in Durham, North Carolina.
Dr. LeRoy Walker emerged as the MEAC’s first commissioner, steering the fledgling conference with a clear vision: NCAA “university division” status. This designation would allow MEAC teams to compete at the highest levels of collegiate sports, particularly in basketball. “We’ll have to play some pretty good basketball,” Walker admitted, but the conference was undeterred.
Another of the league’s masterminds was Talmadge Hill, former Morgan State head basketball coach. He told the Durham Herald-Sun that he had felt for a decade that a new conference was needed.
The MEAC’s early priorities included establishing a robust round-robin schedule, improving athletic facilities, and ensuring academic support for student-athletes. The conference also emphasized diversity, expressing a willingness to recruit white players and compete against predominantly white institutions. “It’s a matter of grouping colleges with similar athletic philosophies,” Walker explained, highlighting the MEAC’s commitment to both excellence and inclusivity.
Morgan State University Interim President Dr. Thomas Fraser outlined the goals of the new league in detail in an interview with the Durham Herald Sun.
“This conference has the potential of becoming the Ivy League academically of black institutions. This is a realization of a dream, the realization of a thrust which we hope will lead us into a higher promise land of collegiate athletics.”
“We believe that the story of achievement of MEAC will go forth as one of the truly outstanding conferences in the nation. It is also in our dream that this conference will be playing predominantly white colleges and universities in the not too distant future.
“Not only will we be playing against mainly white institutions, we hope that white athletes will be recruited heavily to participate on the MEAC athletic teams.”
Pushback and Criticism
Not everyone supported the MEAC’s formation. Clarence “Big House” Gaines, the legendary basketball coach at Winston-Salem State, expressed skepticism about the split. Gaines, whose Rams had won the NCAA College Division Championship in 1967, argued that the CIAA’s strength lay in its HBCU unity. He feared that the breakaway schools might undermine the solidarity that had long been a hallmark of HBCU athletics.
“The new league is football oriented,” WSSU Director of Athletics Clarence Gaines said in 1971. “And I think they may be fooling themselves about the future of small college football. I don’t think the major college label will attract crowds and they won’t be able to play in Yankee Stadium every week. As far as football is concerned, the who country is pro-oriented. Anyway, I wish them well.”
Gaines’ concerns were not unfounded. The CIAA’s remaining members faced challenges in maintaining the competitiveness and visibility of their sports programs. Meanwhile, the MEAC’s focus on NCAA recognition raised questions about the potential costs of aligning too closely with predominantly white institutions and their systems.
The CIAA/MEAC split wasn’t the first of its kind. Many of the same things that led teams from the Southern Conference to leave to create the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) went into the split. But unlike those institutions, these HBCUs — both large and small — to this day remain connected in a way that those institutions never will be.
