The NCAA Division III women's ice hockey is a college ice hockey competition governed by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) as part of the NCAA Division III (DIII or D3). Sixty-seven teams competed in NCAA Division III women's hockey across eight conferences in the 2023âÂÂ24 season.
Conference affiliations and the conferences themselves experienced numerous changes in the later part of the 2010s. The most substantial alterations occurred with the founding of the Colonial Hockey Conference (CHC) in 2015 and the folding of ECAC West in 2017, which precipitated the creation of the Northeast Women's Hockey League (NEWHL) in the same year. The conferences and affiliations presented below are accurate through the 2019âÂÂ20 season.
A conference with seven or more affiliated programs automatically qualifies for the NCAA DIII Women's Ice Hockey Tournament. In practice, the Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference (MASCAC) and the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) are the only conferences that do not receive automatic bids for the tournament.
The Conference of New England (CNE; known before the 2024âÂÂ25 season as the Commonwealth Coast Conference) is a college athletic conference which operates in New England. It added women's ice hockey by taking over the former Colonial Hockey Conference (CHC; previously ECAC North Atlantic) in 2020. As of the 2025âÂÂ26 season, there are seven member programs:
The Little East Conference was formed for the 2025âÂÂ26 season, operating in New England. With the formation of the conference, the New England Hockey Conference (NEHC; previously ECAC East) was discontinued. The seven members of the conference include:
The MASCAC has six members:
The Middle Atlantic Conferences contain eight members:
The Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) is a college athletic conference located in Minnesota. The women's ice hockey programs that compete in the MIAC include:
The most recent change to the MIAC membership came after the 2020âÂÂ21 season, when St. Thomas was expelled from the league and moved to NCAA Division I, joining the Summit League for most sports and the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WHCA) in women's ice hockey. St. Thomas was replaced by St. Scholastica.
The New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) is a college athletic conference of liberal arts colleges and universities located in New England and New York. The member schools of the NESCAC are often referred to as the "Little Ivies." The women's ice hockey programs competing in the NESCAC are:
The Northern Collegiate Hockey Association (NCHA) is a hockey-only conference, which operates in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, and Wisconsin. The women's programs competing in the NCHA are:
The SUNYAC, based in New York, absorbed the Northeast Women's Hockey League (NEWHL; successor of ECAC West). The conference has eight members:
The United Collegiate Hockey Conference (UCHC) is a hockey-only conference which operates in the Mid-Atlantic region. The women's programs competing in the UCHC are:
The Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) is a collegiate athletics conference in Wisconsin, primarily comprising institutions in the University of Wisconsin System. The women's ice hockey programs participating in the WIAC are:
There is currently one independent team:
The Laura Hurd Award is an annual award given to the top player in NCAA Division III Women's Ice Hockey as awarded by the American Hockey Coaches Association (AHCA). Since 2007, it has been named after Laura Hurd, a stand-out player for Elmira College who was killed in a car accident. Previously, it was known as the Division III Women's Player of the Year Award.