The Stanford Cardinal are the athletic teams that represent Stanford University. Stanford's teams compete at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I (Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) for college football) level, primarily in the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC).
Stanford's program has won 139 NCAA team championships, the most of any university. Stanford has won at least one NCAA team championship in 50 consecutive academic years, starting in 1976–77 and continuing through 2025–26. Through July 2026, Stanford athletes have won 576 individual NCAA titles.
Stanford has won 26 of the 32 NACDA Directors' Cups, awarded annually to the most successful overall college sports program in the nation, including 25 consecutive Cups from 1994–95 through 2018–19. 177 Stanford-affiliated athletes have won a total of 335 Summer Olympic medals (162 gold, 93 silver, 80 bronze), including 39 medals at the 2024 Paris games.
Nickname and mascot history A brighter Cardinal red was chosen as Stanford's official color by an assembly of the university's first students in 1891. White was adopted as a secondary color in the 1940s.
Following Stanford's win over California in the first-ever Big Game on March 19, 1892, the team was metonymically referred to as the "Cardinal" by sportswriters in the next day's San Francisco Chronicle. The university's athletic teams continued to be referred to as the "Cardinal" or "Cardinals" even after the adoption of the "Indians" name.
On November 25, 1930, following a unanimous vote by the Executive Committee for the Associated Students, the athletic department adopted the mascot "Indian".
On March 3, 1972, a few months after the football team's second straight win in the Rose Bowl, the Indian symbol and name were dropped by Stanford president Richard Lyman after objections from Native American students and a vote by the student senate.
From 1972 to 1981, the official nickname returned to "Cardinals", a reference to the color, not the bird. During the 1970s, a number of suggestions were put forth as possible nicknames: Robber Barons (a sly reference to Leland Stanford's history), Sequoias, Trees, Railroaders, Spikes, Huns and Griffins. The last suggestion gained enough momentum to prompt the athletics department to move two griffin statues from the site of the former Stanford Home for Convalescent Children to near the athletic facilities.
On November 17, 1981, school president Donald Kennedy declared that the athletic teams be represented by the color cardinal in its singular form.
Stanford has no official mascot, but the Stanford Tree, a member of the Stanford Band wearing a self-designed tree costume, appears at major Stanford sports events. The Tree is based on El Palo Alto, a redwood tree in neighboring Palo Alto that appears in the Stanford seal and athletics logo.
Sports sponsored Stanford University sponsors 36 varsity sports teams — 15 men's, 19 women's, and two coed sports — competing primarily in the NCAA Division I and the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), with the primary affiliation recently changed from the Pac-12 Conference.
Among sports not sponsored by the ACC, men's rowing and women's lightweight rowing compete in the Intercollegiate Rowing Association; men's gymnastics, men's volleyball, beach volleyball, and men's and women's water polo all compete in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF); sailing in the Intercollegiate Sailing Association; squash in the College Squash Association; and artistic swimming under the sport's US governing body of USA Synchro.
In July 2020, due to increased financial constraints caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Stanford Athletics announced they will be eliminating 11 varsity teams after the conclusion of the 2020–21 academic year: men's and women's fencing, field hockey, lightweight rowing, men's rowing, co-ed and women's sailing, squash, artistic swimming, men's volleyball and wrestling. These planned cuts were canceled in May 2021.
Baseball Basketball Basketball Beach volleyball Cross country Cross country Football Field hockey Golf Golf Gymnastics Gymnastics Rowing Lacrosse Soccer Rowing Swimming and diving Rowing lightweight Tennis Soccer Track and field† Softball Volleyball Squash Water polo Swimming and diving Wrestling Artistic swimming Tennis Track and field† Volleyball Water polo Co-ed sports Fencing Sailing Football
Basketball
Baseball
The Cardinal have appeared in the NCAA Division I baseball tournament 35 times, and have appeared in the College World Series 19 times. They have won two National Championships, in 1987 and 1988.
Field Hockey
Men's golf The men's golf team has won eight NCAA Championships: The NCAA started sponsoring the intercollegiate golf championship in 1939, but it retained in its records the titles from the 41 championships previously conferred by the National Intercollegiate Golf Association, including Stanford's 1938 championship. However, the 1938 championship is not counted among Stanford's 139 NCAA team championships. 1939, 1941, 1942 (co-champions), 1946, 1953, 1994, 2007, 2019. They have crowned three individual national champions: Sandy Tatum (1942), Tiger Woods (1996), and Cameron Wilson (2014). They have won 12 Pac-12 Conference championships: 1960, 1968, 1970, 1974, 1977 (south), 1992, 1994, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2019, and 2023 and one Atlantic Coast Conference championship: 2026. Other notable players include Tom Watson, Bob Rosburg, NFL quarterback John Brodie, and Notah Begay III.
Women's golf Stanford golfers have won individual golf championships four times. In 1971, Shelley Hamlin won the women's national intercollegiate individual golf championship (an event conducted by the Division of Girls' and Women's Sports, which evolved into the current NCAA women's golf championship). More recently, Stanford golfers won individual NCAA titles three years in a row: Rachel Heck in 2021, Rose Zhang in 2022, and Rose Zhang again in 2023. Zhang is the only woman who has ever won two NCAA individual titles.
Stanford has won the NCAA team championship four times: in 2015, 2022, 2024, and 2026. From 2015 to the present, the championship has been determined by match play. Stanford is the only team to reach the match play portion of the championship every year it has been offered.
Sailing Stanford Sailing has won the following Intercollegiate Sailing Association championship events: the ICSA Open Fleet Race Championship in 2023 and 2025 the ICSA Open Team Race Championship in 1997 the ICSA Women's Fleet Race Championship from 2023 through 2026 the ICSA Women's Team Race Championship from 2024 through 2026 the ICSA Men's Singlehanded Championship in 1963, 2006, and 2022 the ICSA Women's Singlehanded Championship in 2000 and 2018
In 2023 and 2025, Stanford Sailing won the Leonard M. Fowle Trophy, which the ICSA awards annually to the best overall college team.
In March 2019, John Vandemoer, Stanford University's head sailing coach for 11 years, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit racketeering for accepting bribes in the 2019 college admissions bribery scandal, to hold open admission spots at the university for three applicants falsely portrayed as competitive sailors, in exchange for $770,000 in payments to the sailing program. Unlike others indicted in the scheme, he did not personally benefit financially. The university fired Vandemoer. Clinton Hayes was appointed interim head coach.
Men's soccer
The Cardinal have appeared in the NCAA Division I Men's Soccer Tournament 20 times, including in 8 consecutive years from 2013 through 2020. They have seven appearances in the College Cup, winning the national championship in 2015, 2016, and 2017.
Women's soccer
The Cardinal won the NCAA women's soccer championship in 2011, 2017, and 2019.
Softball
The Cardinal softball team has appeared in four Women's College World Series, in 2001, 2004, 2023, and 2024. The Cardinal program was the co-champions of the PAC-10 conference in 2005, which is their only conference championship. The current head softball coach of the Stanford program is Jessica Allister.
Men's tennis The Cardinal have won 17 NCAA Men's tennis championships: 1973, 1974, 1977, 1978, 1980, 1981, 1983, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1992, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, and 2000.
Women's tennis The Cardinal have won 20 of the 43 NCAA women's tennis team championships that have taken place, winning in 1982, 1984, 1986, 1987 through 1991, 1997, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2004 through 2006, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2018, and 2019. Stanford also won the 1978 women's tennis championship, awarded by the AIAW. 2023 was the first year in which Stanford held fewer than half of the NCAA team championships ever awarded.
Stanford tennis players have won the individual singles championship many times: Years Player Organiser1964Jane AlbertAIAW1979Kathy JordanAIAW1982Alycia MoultonNCAA1985Linda GatesNCAA1986 and 1987Patty FendickNCAA1989Sandra BirchNCAA1990Debbie GrahamNCAA1991Sandra BirchNCAA1997Lilia OsterlohNCAA2000 and 2001Laura GranvilleNCAA2003 and 2004Amber LiuNCAA2012 and 2013Nicole GibbsNCAA
Stanford tennis players have also won the doubles championship many times: Years Players Organiser1962Linda Yeomans and Carol HanksAIAW1967Jane Albert and Julie AnthonyAIAW1976 and 1977Susie Hagey and Diane MorrisonAIAW1978Barbara Jordan and Kathy JordanAIAW1979Kathy Jordan and Alycia MoultonAIAW1981Caryn Copeland and Alycia MoultonAIAW1984Linda Gates and Elise BurginNCAA1985Linda Gates and Leigh-Anne EldredgeNCAA1990Meredith McGrath and Teri WhitlingerNCAA2002Lauren Kalvaria and Gabriela LastraNCAA2005Alice Barnes and Erin BurdetteNCAA2010Hilary Barte and Lindsay BurdetteNCAA2011Hilary Barte and Mallory BurdetteNCAA2012Mallory Burdette and Nicole GibbsNCAA
Future astronaut Sally Ride was the team's top player in 1971. The NCAA later honored her with two awards given to former college athletes who distinguished themselves in their professional lives: the Silver Anniversary Award in 1998, and the Theodore Roosevelt Award, described as the highest honor the NCAA may confer on an individual, in 2005.
Track and field
Men's volleyball The Stanford Cardinal men's volleyball team represents Stanford in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation. They are currently led by head coach John Kosty, who took the job in 2007, and play their home games at Maples Pavilion. The team has won two NCAA National Championships (1997 and 2010), plus earned NCAA Runner-up twice, as well.
Notable players
Barry Brown Canyon Ceman Scott Fortune Matt Fuerbringer Gabriel Gardner Kevin Hansen Adam Keefe Michael Lambert Jon Root James Shaw Erik Shoji Kawika Shoji John Taylor Andy Witt
Women's volleyball
The Cardinal have won 9 NCAA Women's volleyball national championships: in 1992, 1994, 1996, 1997, 2001, 2004, 2016, 2018 and 2019. Stanford has appeared in 17 championship games, more than any other team. Stanford has qualified for 42 of the 43 NCAA tournaments, missing the postseason only during the COVID-shortened 2020–21 season. Only Penn State has appeared in all 43 tournaments.
Women's water polo The Cardinal have won 10 NCAA national championships in women's water polo, more than any other university: in 2002, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2022, 2023, and 2025. Stanford is the only program that has participated in every NCAA Championship since the event began in 2001. Stanford has advanced to the title match in 13 of the last 15 championships.
Wrestling The Stanford wrestling team is coached by Rob Koll, replacing Jason Borelli after he took the head coaching job at American University in 2021. In his 13 years as head coach, Borelli led the Cardinal to 122 dual wins, making him Stanford's winningest coach. The Cardinal wrestlers practice in the Weintz Family Wrestling Room, and compete on campus at Burnham Pavilion, with a capacity of about 1,400.