The groundwork for the Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference stems from a meeting of baseball coaches in the fall of 1949. Attending that meeting was Kyle Anderson of the University of Chicago, Ed Glancy of the Illinois Institute of Technology, George Boyle of the Chicago Teachers College (now Northeastern Illinois University), and Les Miller of the University of Illinois-Chicago Navy Pier. Concordia College joined the group and the first sporting event was a baseball tourney on Memorial Day weekend of 1950 at the University of Chicago's Stagg Field. The host University of Chicago team won that first tourney.  In 1952, league play started for baseball for the original four members. Lewis College and Aurora College joined the tourney in 1954 and North Park College entered in 1959.

The men's basketball coaches met in February of 1972 to form their conference sport that started with the 1973-74 season. The original basketball members were Illinois Institute of Technology, Saint Xavier College, Northeastern Illinois University, University of Illinois-Chicago Circle, Purdue University Calumet, Trinity Christian College and College of St. Francis. The conference also added cross country and tennis in the mid-1970's.

In the late 1970's, Roosevelt University joined the conference but Lewis, Illinois-Chicago, and Chicago State left to join the NCAA in 1980. Rosary College (now Domincan University) and Olivet Nazarene University joined to become core members of the conference. In 1982, Mundelein College and National College of Education joined and the conference added the women's sports of volleyball, tennis, softball and basketball. Roosevelt and National-Louis University dropped their athletic programs and Mundelein College merged with Loyola University but the CCAC has added new members (Calumet St. Joseph, Indiana South Bend, Judson, Trinity International, Robert Morris, Cardinal Stritch and Purdue North Central) and sports (men's and women's soccer, division II basketball) in recent years that have left the CCAC one of the largest in the NAIA.