Olympic Rugby Star Ilona Maher Condemns Alma Mater Quinnipiac University for Demoting Women’s Rugby to Club Status

U.S. Olympic rugby star and cultural icon Ilona Maher has publicly condemned Quinnipiac University, her alma mater, after the Connecticut institution announced it would demote its women’s rugby program from varsity to club status. Maher, who became the most-followed rugby player in the world during the 2024 Paris Olympics, posted “shame on you” on social media in a sharp rebuke that has reignited national debate over the treatment of women’s sports programs at American universities.

The decision to downgrade women’s rugby at Quinnipiac carries particular irony given the program’s most famous alumna. Ilona Maher played rugby at the Hamden, Connecticut university before going on to represent the United States at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and the 2024 Paris Olympics, where she helped lead Team USA to a bronze medal in women’s rugby sevens — the first-ever Olympic medal for the U.S. women’s rugby program. Since then, Maher has transcended the sport entirely, appearing on “Dancing with the Stars,” signing endorsement deals with major brands, and becoming one of the most visible advocates for women’s athletics and body positivity in American sports. Her Quinnipiac roots have been a consistent part of her public narrative, making the university’s decision to demote the very program that launched her career a particularly stinging development for both Maher and supporters of women’s rugby.

The move from varsity to club status is far more than a semantic reclassification. Varsity programs receive institutional funding for coaching staff, facilities, travel, recruitment, and athletic scholarships. Club sports, by contrast, are typically student-run, rely on fundraising and dues, and do not offer scholarships. For aspiring collegiate rugby players, the loss of a varsity program means one fewer pathway to compete at the highest level while receiving financial support for their education. Women’s rugby has been one of the fastest-growing collegiate sports in the United States, with USA Rugby and the NCAA exploring ways to expand its footprint. The NCAA officially recognized women’s rugby as an “emerging sport” for women in 2002, a designation meant to help schools add women’s sports to comply with Title IX. As of recent counts, there are roughly 40 varsity women’s rugby programs at the NCAA level, though hundreds more exist as club programs. Every varsity program that reverts to club status represents a step backward for the sport’s efforts to gain permanent NCAA championship status, which requires a minimum of 40 varsity programs sponsoring the sport.

Universities across the country have faced increasing financial pressure on their athletic departments, particularly at the mid-major level where television revenue and donor support lag far behind Power Four conference schools. The recent settlement in the House v. NCAA case, which will require schools to share revenue with athletes beginning as early as the 2025-26 academic year, has accelerated budget conversations at institutions like Quinnipiac. Some schools have responded by cutting non-revenue sports — often disproportionately affecting women’s programs and Olympic sports. Advocates for women’s athletics argue that these financial pressures cannot be used as an excuse to retreat from Title IX obligations, particularly when men’s programs with comparable or lower participation numbers are retained.

Maher’s public condemnation adds significant visibility to what might otherwise have been a local story. With her enormous social media following and mainstream cultural cachet, her criticism has the potential to generate real reputational consequences for Quinnipiac and to pressure the administration to reconsider. It also puts a spotlight on the broader vulnerability of women’s rugby at the collegiate level at a moment when the sport is gaining international momentum — World Rugby has been actively campaigning for rugby sevens to maintain its place on the Olympic program, and the sport’s continued growth in the United States is seen as critical to that effort. Whether Quinnipiac reverses course, faces formal Title IX complaints, or other universities follow suit in cutting women’s rugby programs will be closely watched in the months ahead.