The Evansville Purple Aces are the intercollegiate sports teams and players of the

University of Evansville The University of Evansville (UE) is a private university in Evansville, Indiana. It was founded in 1854 as Moores Hill College. The university operates a satellite center, Harlaxton College, in Grantham, England. UE offers more than 80 differ ...

, located in

Evansville, Indiana Evansville is a city in, and the county seat of, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States. The population was 118,414 at the 2020 census, making it the state's third-most populous city after Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, the largest city i ...

. The Aces athletic program is a member of the

Missouri Valley Conference The Missouri Valley Conference (also called MVC or simply "The Valley") is the third-oldest collegiate athletic conference in the United States. The conference's members are primarily located in the midwest. History The MVC was established ...

and competes at the

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges ...

's Division I level. Evansville's mascot is Ace Purple, and the school colors are purple, white and orange. Prior to joining Division I in 1977, the Aces were in the Division II men's basketball championship tournaments 15 of 20 years and won the title in

1959 Events January * January 1 - Cuba: Fulgencio Batista flees Havana when the forces of Fidel Castro advance. * January 2 - Lunar probe Luna 1 was the first man-made object to attain escape velocity from Earth. It reached the vicinity of E ...

, '60, '64, '65, and '71.

Sports sponsored

Moores Hill College moved to Evansville and became Evansville College in 1919. The athletics program was begun with the opening of the new campus. A member of the

, the University of Evansville sponsors teams in seven men's and nine women's

sanctioned sports.

Baseball

Five players from the Purple Aces baseball team have appeared in

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (A ...

: Andy Benes,

Sal Fasano Salvatore Frank Fasano (; born August 10, 1971) is an American former professional baseball catcher, who played for nine different Major League Baseball (MLB) teams over his 11-year big league career. Upon retiring as a player, he became a coach ...

, Jamey Carroll,

Kyle Freeland Kyle Richard Freeland (born May 14, 1993) is an American professional baseball pitcher for the Colorado Rockies of Major League Baseball (MLB). He played college baseball at Evansville and was drafted by the Rockies with the eighth pick in the f ...

, and

Rob Maurer Robert John Maurer (born January 7, 1967) is a retired Major League Baseball (MLB) first baseman, Maurer attended Mater Dei High School in Evansville, Indiana and the University of Evansville, where he played for the Evansville Purple Aces Th ...

Men's basketball

The University of Evansville athletics department was built upon a foundation of success in men's

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

. In the early years of the men's basketball program the Purple Aces appeared in the NAIA national tournament. The Purple Aces appeared 4 times in the NAIA Tournament (

1941 Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January–August – 10,072 men, women and children with mental and physical disabilities are asphyxiated with carbon monoxide in a gas chamber, at Hadamar E ...

, 1942,

1951 Events January * January 4 – Korean War: Third Battle of Seoul – Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul for the second time (having lost the Second Battle of Seoul in September 1950). * January 9 – The Government of the United ...

, and

1955 Events January * January 3 – José Ramón Guizado becomes president of Panama. * January 17 – , the first nuclear-powered submarine, puts to sea for the first time, from Groton, Connecticut. * January 18– 20 – Battle of Yijiangs ...

). The Purple Aces had a NAIA tournament record of 3–4. The furthest distance Evansville got in the NAIA tournaments was in third round (NAIA Quarterfinals) in 1951, only to lose to Regis University (Colo.) 70–68. Shortly after the 1955 season the Purple Aces would move up to the NCAA College Division, now called

NCAA Division II NCAA Division II (D-II) is an intermediate-level division of competition in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). It offers an alternative to both the larger and better-funded Division I and to the scholarship-free environmen ...

. The Evansville Purple Aces won five national championships in the NCAA College Division:

1960 It is also known as the "Year of Africa" because of major events—particularly the independence of seventeen African nations—that focused global attention on the continent and intensified feelings of Pan-Africanism. Events January * Ja ...

, 1964,

1965 Events January–February * January 14 – The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland and the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland meet for the first time in 43 years. * January 20 ** Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in for a full term ...

(29–0 record) and

1971 * The year 1971 had three partial solar eclipses ( February 25, July 22 and August 20) and two total lunar eclipses ( February 10, and August 6). The world population increased by 2.1% this year, the highest increase in history. Events J ...

. This ranks second all-time. In 1977 UE began playing in

NCAA Division I NCAA Division I (D-I) is the highest level of intercollegiate athletics sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States, which accepts players globally. D-I schools include the major collegiate athleti ...

athletics. That same year on December 13, a chartered DC-3 carrying the entire UE basketball team crashed in a field near the Evansville Regional Airport en route to a game against

Middle Tennessee State Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU or MT) is a public university in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Founded in 1911 as a normal school, the university consists of eight undergraduate colleges as well as a college of graduate studies, together off ...

. Every member of the team and coaching staff on the plane was killed. Legendary Aces coach

Arad McCutchan Arad A. McCutchan (July 4, 1912 – June 16, 1993) was a collegiate basketball coach. The Evansville, Indiana, native coached his hometown University of Evansville from 1946 to 1977, guiding the Purple Aces to a 514–314 record. McCutchan spent ...

, had retired after the previous season and was not on the plane. McCutchan was the first NCAA College Division coach selected to the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. One player was not able to attend the game and thus was not on the plane; not long after the plane crash, however, the player who was not on the plane was killed in a car accident along with his younger brother. Tremendous community support brought back the basketball program the next year.

Brad Leaf Brad Leaf ( he, ברד ליף; born May 17, 1960) is an American-Israeli basketball coach and former player. He played 17 years of professional basketball in Israel, first for Hapoel Galil Elyon and later for Maccabi Tel Aviv of the Israel Premie ...

played for the Evansville Purple Aces from 1979 to 1982, and was a co-captain in his last year. As a sophomore, he set the then-Evansville season free throw percentage record at 81.1%. In 1981–82, he led the school to its first NCAA Division I tournament. He was the school's first All-American in NCAA Division I. Leaf was 5th in school history in field goals (621), 6th in

field goal percentage Field goal percentage in basketball is the ratio of field goals made to field goals attempted. Its abbreviation is FG%. Although three-point field goal percentage is often calculated separately, three-point field goals are included in the genera ...

(52.2%), 7th in points (1,605), and 9th in

free throw In basketball, free throws or foul shots are unopposed attempts to score points by shooting from behind the free-throw line (informally known as the foul line or the charity stripe), a line situated at the end of the restricted area. Free throws ...

s (363). Evansville was a charter member of the Midwest Collegiate Conference, now known as the Horizon League. The Aces won or shared the MCC regular season title in 1982, 1987, 1989, 1992, and 1993. They also won the conference tournament title in 1982, 1992, and 1993. The Aces are now a member of the

, and won the 1999 regular season title. The Purple Aces have made five trips to the NCAA Men's basketball tournament (

1982 Events January * January 1 – In Malaysia and Singapore, clocks are adjusted to the same time zone, UTC+8 (GMT+8.00). * January 13 – Air Florida Flight 90 crashes shortly after takeoff into the 14th Street Bridge in Washington, D.C ...

1989 File:1989 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Cypress Street Viaduct, Cypress structure collapses as a result of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, killing motorists below; The proposal document for the World Wide Web is submitted; The Exxo ...

1992 File:1992 Events Collage V1.png, From left, clockwise: Riots break out across Los Angeles, California after the police beating of Rodney King; El Al Flight 1862 crashes into a residential apartment building in Amsterdam after two of its engin ...

, 1993,

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

), two trips to the NIT ( 1988,

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which sank in the Baltic Sea; Nels ...

), three trips to the CollegeInsider.com (CIT) tournament (

2009 File:2009 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The vertical stabilizer of Air France Flight 447 is pulled out from the Atlantic Ocean; Barack Obama becomes the first African American to become President of the United States; Protests ...

2013 File:2013 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: Edward Snowden becomes internationally famous for leaking classified NSA wiretapping information; Typhoon Haiyan kills over 6,000 in the Philippines and Southeast Asia; The Dhaka garment fa ...

, and Champions in 2015), and two trips to the College Basketball Invitational (CBI) tournament (

2011 File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrates ...

and

2012 File:2012 Events Collage V3.png, From left, clockwise: The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia lies capsized after the Costa Concordia disaster; Damage to Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey as a result of Hurricane Sandy; People gat ...

). On November 12, 2019, the Evansville team took down the #1 ranked University of Kentucky basketball team in UK's home of Rupp Arena, gaining national and global prestige for the upset.

Women's basketball

The University of Evansville women's basketball team (historically the Lady Aces, though now also known as Purple Aces) have made two trips to the NCAA basketball tournament (

Football

The University of Evansville first fielded a football team in 1898. Known early on as the 49ers, Evansville played in the NCAA College Division through 1975, after which they played as an

NCAA Division III NCAA Division III (D-III) is a division of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States. D-III consists of athletic programs at colleges and universities that choose not to offer athletic scholarships to their ...

non-scholarship program. They were champions of the

Ohio Valley Conference The Ohio Valley Conference (OVC) is a collegiate athletic conference which operates in the Midwestern and Southeastern United States. It participates in Division I of the NCAA; the conference's football programs compete in the Football Cham ...

in 1948 (shared with Morehead State) with a 6–3 (3–1 OVC) record and 1949 with an 8–2–1 (3–1–1 OVC) mark. Following new NCAA regulations requiring university football and basketball teams to compete at the same division, Evansville became a charter member of the

Pioneer Football League The Pioneer Football League (PFL) is a collegiate athletic conference which operates in the United States. The conference participates in the NCAA's Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) as a football-only conference. It has member ...

(PFL), an

non-scholarship league. They remained PFL members until their shut down following the 1997 season. Citing financial difficulties and a belief that the PFL was not sustainable, the Purple Aces closed the doors on their football program after almost a century on the gridiron. Evansville's all-time record stands at 268–381–26. Talk has existed since about 2007 about upgrading football again to a fully funded NCAA Division I team, but, after a year of investigation, the Board of Trustees voted against this in October 2012 as currently being too expensive.

References

External links

* {{Authority control