BYU has acknowledged the women’s rugby team as an extramural sport. Why is that important? The answer lies in the complicated relationship between school and team.

BYU classifies non-varsity sports as either intramural or extramural. Intramural sports are played within a college's student body, while extramurals seek competition from other school teams. At BYU, extramural sports are also university funded, a reason why, up until today, there were only five teams with this classification. Men's rugby is an extramural sport. Years ago, the women’s team had requested the extramural status without the funding – just so it could be associated with its school, like the majority of college club teams around the country. But that violated the university charter; extramural teams had to have school funding. (Read more, as reported by Alex Goff in 2007)

So the women from BYU and longtime coach Tom Waqa dubbed themselves “Women’s Cougar Rugby” (WCR). USA Rugby issued a waiver, indicating that WCR didn’t need to prove its good standing with BYU because the school didn’t acknowledge the women’s program.

But about five years ago, BYU’s Campus Life inherited the Extramural Sports department, and things started to change.

“We had a goal internally to have more women participate; it was the right thing to do, to bring them in,” said Morris Havea, BYU Director of Extramural Sports. “We’ve had representatives from the women’s club meet with administrators since then. It’s been a long process.”

Havea indicated that lack of funding was never the issue; however, he couldn’t speak to a time before Extramural Sports was part of Campus Life. And the decision to add women’s rugby had nothing to do with the program’s long history of national championship appearances or players named to national teams. The director reiterated, it was just the right time for an upgrade.

So what changes for the team? Aside from funding – which is huge – the team is officially recognized as BYU Women’s Rugby, affording use of the school’s logo, on-campus facilities and resources, trainer, coach, and much more. The change also means that the university has launched an official coach search and Waqa must apply for the job.

“Hopefully I stay on,” Waqa wrote. “This is BYU’s team now, and Morris Havea is the Director of Extramurals. As of now, I’m staying on as unofficial coach while the restructuring process takes place. This is a huge boost for BYU Women’s Rugby. It’s bittersweet for me, to say farewell to that team identity.”

There are now seven BYU teams with extramural status, and while there are no immediate plans to add any other teams, the university, women’s rugby team, and coach are happy to relish a long-awaited victory.