Abilene Christian

Abilene Christian moved up from Division II in 2013 and spent its first Division I decade without a single conference championship, playing home games three and a half miles off campus at the city-owned Shotwell Stadium until the on-campus Anthony Field at Wildcat Stadium opened in 2017. The drought ended almost immediately once Keith Patterson arrived in December 2021: his first team went 7-4 in 2022, sharing the WAC championship with Stephen F. Austin.

In 2024, picked sixth in the preseason UAC poll, the Wildcats went 9-5 (7-1) and won the conference outright, clinching the title with a 35-31, last-second win over rival Tarleton State on November 16 — the program's first-ever FCS Playoff berth. They routed Northern Arizona 24-0 in the first round before falling 51-31 to eventual national champion North Dakota State in the second round. In 2025, Abilene Christian repeated at 9-5 (7-1), sharing the UAC title with Tarleton State after beating the Texans again 31-28 on a 47-yard field goal at the final horn, then beat Lamar 38-20 in the playoff opener before losing 41-34 at Stephen F. Austin in the second round.

Three conference championships and two playoff appearances in four seasons is a level of sustained winning the program had never reached in its first eight years of Division I football. The question in Abilene now is whether that holds up as a real, program-level shift — or whether it was a Keith Patterson-shaped hot streak. The 2026 opener asked it in the sharpest form yet: a 21-14 loss at Lamar — a team the Wildcats beat 38-20 in December's playoff opener — as a 7.5-point favorite.