Patriot League
| Formerly | Colonial League |
|---|---|
| Association | NCAA |
| Founded | 1986 |
| Commissioner | Jennifer Heppel (since 2015) |
| Sports fielded |
|
| Division | Division I |
| Subdivision | FCS |
| No. of teams | 10 full, 4 associate |
| Headquarters | Bethlehem, Pennsylvania |
| Region | Northeast, Mid-Atlantic |
| Broadcasters | CBS Sports ESPN |
| Official website | patriotleague.org |
| Locations | |
The Patriot League is a collegiate athletic conference comprising primarily leading private institutions of higher education and two United States service academies based in the Northeastern United States. Except for the Ivy League, it is the most selective group of higher education institutions in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I and has a very high student-athlete graduation rate for both the NCAA graduation success rate and the federal graduation rate.
The Patriot League has 10 core members: American University, the United States Military Academy (Army), Boston University, Bucknell University, Colgate University, College of the Holy Cross, Lafayette College, Lehigh University, Loyola University Maryland, and the United States Naval Academy (Navy). All 10 core members participate in the NCAA Division I for all Patriot League sports that they offer. Since the conference does not offer every available NCAA sport, most schools are affiliated with other collegiate conferences for sports such as ice hockey and wrestling, and five other schools whose home conferences do not sponsor sports that they offer are associate members of the Patriot League for those sports.
Only half of the conference's core members compete in the Patriot League for football, as part of the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS): Bucknell, Colgate, Holy Cross, Lafayette, and Lehigh. Of the five other conference members, American, Boston University, and Loyola Maryland do not sponsor football, while Army and Navy play in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision as football-only members of the American Athletic Conference (The American).
Five other institutions are Patriot League members only for specific sports, and are referred to as associate members. Fordham University, Georgetown University, and the University of Richmond are associate members in football, while Georgetown and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) are associate members in women's rowing. Two more schools will join as associate members for football in 2026—Villanova University and the College of William & Mary.