Stanford student-athletes are poised to make history this academic year – a 50th consecutive year with at least one National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) team title.

Stanford has captured at least one NCAA team title every year since Nov. 28, 1976, when the men’s water polo team beat UCLA.

In the decades since, Stanford student-athletes have taken home trophies in sports spanning from the swimming pool to the soccer pitch, from the volleyball court to the baseball diamond – totaling 137 NCAA team titles with 70 in men’s sports and 67 in women’s sports. Stanford is also the all-time leader in NCAA championships overall.

Stanford’s streak outpaces other Division I schools by a wide margin; the school with the second-longest active streak is North Carolina at seven years, and USC once held a 19-year-long streak from 1959-60 through 1977-78.

Most of Stanford’s 36 sports have a chance to extend the streak, except for a handful, which are not sponsored by the NCAA. Women’s tennis has brought home the most NCAA team titles for Stanford during the streak, with 20, followed by men’s tennis at 15, and both men’s water polo and women’s swimming at 11.

Stanford’s teams have an opportunity to capture a team title between August and June each academic year to continue the streak. The final possibility of an NCAA championship is with baseball, typically in the last week of June at the Men’s College World Series.

Last year was a nail-biter for the streak: Stanford didn’t win an NCAA team title until May 11, when the women’s water polo team came out on top against USC. Women’s rowing added a title three weeks later. The latest date that Stanford has waited to extend the streak was May 25, 1978, when men’s tennis defeated UCLA.

Stanford has won as many as six NCAA team titles in one year (a school record), which happened in 1996-97 and 2018-19, and there have been 11 years in which one team single-handedly kept the active streak alive.

Stanford women’s cross country teams will get the first shot at securing the 50-year streak when they compete Saturday, Nov. 22, at the NCAA Championship in Missouri.

Other fall sport NCAA championship possibilities over the next month include men’s water polo, men’s and women’s soccer, and women’s volleyball.