It’s hard to say what got more attention, Mississippi College’s decision to change its name or to drop its football program.
The Baptist-affiliated school in Clinton has decided to rebrand itself, taking the name Mississippi Christian University. The change, which takes effect during the school’s bicentennial year in 2026, makes its religious connection more obvious while also upgrading its perceived academic status. The word “university” not only indicates the school offers undergraduate and graduate programs, but it also carries more prestige than does “college.”
As with all name changes, it will take some time to get used to it. It should help that the school, at last initially, plans to continue going by its longtime acronym “MC.” It would not be surprising, though, for the branding over time to gravitate toward “MCU,” just as Texas Christian University is popularly known as “TCU.”
Unlike TCU, though, Mississippi College has decided to abandon football, effective immediately, as a sport in which it can be successful.
The decision is not going over well with some of the current and former players and coaches, but it’s completely understandable.
Mississippi College has not been able to compete even in the lower divisions for some time. The Choctaws haven’t had a winning season since 2009, and their Division II national championship in 1989 is a distant memory, as is the penalty that forced them to relinquish the title because of recruiting infractions.
The school’s current administration saw the competitive gap only increasing, unless it was prepared to compromise on its principles and start paying players by helping them land “name, image and likeness” deals and recruiting them away from other schools with the promise of a larger NIL payoff.
Although most of the big money for college football players is in the Division I programs, the rapid professionalization of the sport is also having an impact on the lower divisions. An increasing number of Division II athletes are transferring up to Division I or to other Division II schools where they can get more than a good education for their athletic talents.
“We made the decision that we couldn’t do really well in football anymore,” Mississippi College President Blake Thompson acknowledged in an interview with Magnolia Tribune following the school’s announcement.
It must have been a difficult call, but it sounds like the right one.
NIL and the transfer portal have only complicated what was already a challenging economic picture for Division II football programs. The sport is easily the most expensive for a college to run. It requires more players, more expensive equipment and larger facilities. Unlike for Division I schools, there are no lucrative television deals at the Division II level or much in the way of gate receipts to offset those costs. On average, Division II schools with a football program lose more money on athletics than those without one.
Dropping football will allow Mississippi College, soon to be Mississippi Christian University, to do more for the student-athletes in the 17 sports that will continue. For them, this change should be a win.
