BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – The wait is over.

As of midnight today, July 1, Missouri and Texas A&M officially became the 13th and 14th members of the Southeastern Conference and will enjoy full league membership immediately. It is the first expansion of the SEC membership since Arkansas and South Carolina joined the conference in 1992.

Missouri was a charter member of the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association in 1907, which became the Big Six Conference in 1964, the Big Eight Conference in 1964 and the Big 12 Conference in 1996.

Texas A&M was a charter member of the Southwest Conference during its formation in 1915. Current SEC member Arkansas was a fellow SWC charter member until its move to the SEC in 1992. Following the dissolution of the SWC in 1996, the Aggies have been a member of the South Division of the Big 12 Conference.

Both Missouri and Texas A&M are among the select group of public universities invited to membership in the prestigious Association of American Universities (AAU). The SEC now has four schools that are part of the AAU, as the two new members join Florida and Vanderbilt.

This marks just the fourth time in the history of the conference that the SEC has expanded its membership. In a landscape that has seemed ever-changing in recent years, the SEC has exemplified stability, as 10 of its original 13 members remain.

The SEC began as a 13-team league until Sewanee’s departure from the conference in 1940. After Georgia Tech’s move to independent status in 1964, the league had 11 members before Tulane departed in 1966, leaving the SEC as a 10-team conference for more than two decades.

At the start of the decade of the 1990s, a similar shift in conference alignment allowed Arkansas and South Carolina to join the SEC. The benefits have been nothing short of outstanding.

Be sure to explore the SEC Digital Network for full coverage of the SEC’s two newest members.