Any BYU varsity sport put on by BYUtv is subsidized at least partially by the AD. The AD is not going to pay for non-varsity sport broadcasts.

If Rugby could line up sponsors willing to pay for the Rugby broadcasts, BYUtv would produce them. But there are a couple of problems with that. I'll illustrate the first by pointing out that CWU rugby defeated Oregon State 129-0 to zero. Would you want to watch that game? Would the casual Rugby fan want to watch that game? Would somebody just flipping through the channels want to watch that game? I submit that only the die-hard fans of the CWU rugby team would really watch it. Most either wouldn't tune in, or they would get bored and leave.

Would you care to sponsor a game like that? Would you take your limited advertising budget and use it to produce a product that only a few people watch?

How many BYU rugby games played at South Field each year can you say are truly competitive? Not many. (In fact, that was one reason that Jonny Linehan gave for dropping rugby -- the lack of competitive games.) Our A-side won every single game played at South Field this year by more than 30 points. Good luck finding sponsors willing to pay for that. They want competitive games. They don't want blow-outs.

The second reason has to do with the size of the market. True, BYU Rugby does have an international following, but why should local sponsors such as Rhodes Bake-n-serve care about that? Any money they spend reaching a market outside of their market footprint is money wasted. There has to be enough potential viewers inside their footprint to make rugby sponsorship worthwhile to them. If there aren't they are not going spend their hard-earned cash funding it.

So for the time being unless the BYU, the BYUtv, and/or the Church's publicity/missionary departments wishes to fund rugby broadcasts, it's not going to happen.

As for the future, who knows? Interest in the game has been increasing rapidly in the past few years. Parity in College Rugby have been increasing along with that interest. If that trend keeps up, there will be more and more fans following more and more competitive games. That means there will be more people wanting to watch the game. And when there are sufficient number of people wanting to watch; somebody, somewhere is going to want to sponsor the broadcast.