Sports in Charlotte, North Carolina

Sports in Charlotte, North Carolina have a long and varied history. The city is home to teams at nearly every level of American sports including the Carolina Panthers of the National Football League and Charlotte Hornets of the National Basketball Association. In addition to serving as the home base for several teams the city plays host to many events of national and international importance including the longest race in NASCAR, the annual Coca-Cola 600 and golf's Wells Fargo Championship.

Teams and history

Professional and non-collegiate amateur

The history of professional

In 1987 businessman

Since 2005 Charlotte has been home to a women's football team called the Carolina Queens. The Queens play home games at Hopewell High's stadium in Huntersville.

Despite being a warm-weather,

Lacrosse is a sport with a relatively short history in Charlotte but one that is experiencing growth following the formation of two professional lacrosse teams. The Charlotte Hounds are a field lacrosse team that plays in Major League Lacrosse, the top level of the sport in the United States, out of Memorial Stadium. The Hounds began play in 2012 and were founded by Jim McPhilliamy. Charlotte's other lacrosse team, the Charlotte Copperheads, plays the indoor version of the game, box lacrosse, in the Professional Lacrosse League.

Renaissance Park

.

Charlotte is home to one of

college rugby

players and is based at the Skillbeck Athletic Grounds in Coulwood, a neighborhood in the northwestern portion of the city.

The

Charlotte Roller Girls organization is a flat-track roller derby club that was founded by several local women in 2006 and plays out of the Grady Cole Center

.

Since 1931,

Mid-Atlantic Wrestling. National Wrestling Alliance, World Championship Wrestling, WWE has big matches, and many pay-per-view

event. Many professional wrestlers living.

Collegiate

Team	Division	Primary Conference	Location	Varsity Teams
Charlotte 49ers	NCAA I	Conference USA	University City, Charlotte	17
Davidson Wildcats	NCAA I	Atlantic 10	Davidson, North Carolina	19
Queens Royals	NCAA I	A-Sun Conference	Myers Park, Charlotte	19
JCSU Golden Bulls	NCAA II	CIAA	Biddleville, Charlotte	13
Johnson & Wales Wildcats	USCAA	Independent	Uptown Charlotte	5

collegiate athletic programs and is where the offices of the Big South Conference

are based.

The

public universities

in the state of North Carolina.

Davidson College, founded in 1837 and based in the eponymous north Mecklenburg town, is the oldest of these institutions and is the home of the Wildcats. A full NCAA Division I program, Davidson is a member of the Atlantic 10 Conference and fields 19 varsity teams.

Charlotte and Davidson compete in men's basketball for the Hornets' Nest Trophy. Charlotte leads the all-time series 29-17

Presbyterian school based in the Charlotte neighborhood of Myers Park. Queens began life in 1857 as the Charlotte Female Institute. In the 1980s Queens began admitting male students. The Queens Royals play in the South Atlantic Conference at the NCAA Division II

level.

A newcomer, the Charlotte campus of Johnson & Wales University was established in 2004. The JWU Wildcats play men's basketball and women's volleyball as independent members of the United States Collegiate Athletic Association.

The annual CIAA Basketball Tournament was held in Charlotte from 2006-2020. The tournament attracted over 100,000 fans and spectators and had a $55 million economic impact on the city.^[9] The sustained success of the tournament led to the CIAA's decision to relocate its headquarters from Hampton, VA to Charlotte in August 2015.^[10]

The city is also the home of the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) headquarters. The NJCAA is the second-largest national intercollegiate athletic organization in the United States with over 500 member schools in 43 states.^[11]

High schools

Charlotte-Mecklenburg's high school teams are aligned into the following conferences as assigned by the North Carolina High School Athletic Association.

Mecklenburg County has long been a superpower in North Carolina high school sports dating back to Garinger's (then known as Charlotte High School) multiple football championships in the 1910s. Garinger in its historic and present day forms would go on to become the earliest of the Charlotte powers in the first half of the 20th century before seeing its fortunes fade in the latter half. Garinger most recently claimed a state championship with its 1989 boys basketball team.

The late 20th and early 21st centuries were marked by the rise of Butler, Independence, and West Charlotte as state football powers. West Charlotte's Lions dominated the state football scene between the mid-80s and 90s, a period during which they won five championships in a ten-year span. The late-90s saw Independence begin a 107-game winning streak that included seven consecutive state championships under coach Tom Knotts. Independence's streak would last until 2007 when

Along with

Uptown Charlotte is home of the NASCAR Hall of Fame and the now defunct Charlotte Speedway was the site of the first NASCAR Strictly Stock (a precursor to the modern NASCAR Cup Series) race on June 19, 1949, Bob Flock won the pole and Jim Roper was declared the winner after Glenn Dunaway's car failed post-race inspection.

Since then a number of Charlotte-area venues have played host to NASCAR's top series including

Events

As with all of

The

The

Brooklandwood in the nearby Union County town of Mineral Springs is the site of the Queens Cup Steeplechase, one of steeplechase horse racing's major annual events. The program consists of several races, and is held the last Saturday of April and also features a Jack Russell Terrier judging contest.

Several cycling events take place in Charlotte including the Presbyterian Hospital Invitational Criterium and 24-Hours of Booty.

Venues

Present

Defunct

References

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