The University of Utah is still waiting to find out if they have a game this Saturday. It is not clear, yet, whether the University of Oklahoma will play in the opening Round of the Varsity Cup.

Oklahoma received a punishment for fielding ineligible players during league games last fall. The fairly standard punishment of forfeiting the league games the players (all non-students) appeared in (four out of the five) means that Oklahoma is no longer the winner of the Red River DIA Conference - Texas A&M is. Oklahoma also got a post-season ban for this spring only (this compares to University of Indiana's two-year playoff ban for a similar offense - the difference being Oklahoma outed themselves in a letter to USA Rugby, and Indiana didn't).

It's that ban that is under discussion. The Varsity Cup contends that the ban doesn't cover their competition, because USA Rugby has never considered the Varsity Cup a post-season, and as such OU's appearance in it would be as innocuous as the Sooners playing a friendly against the Tulsa men's club. However, USA Rugby representatives appear to be saying that their definition of postseason is any games after the league season. 

USA Rugby's ruling specifically said that 7s play is allowed, and Oklahoma could play in 7s tournaments this spring. But said OU is "ineligible to advance to any/all Spring 2015 post-season."

While that is being sorted out, the University of Utah program is trying to figure out whether they should print and sell tickets, and how to promote a game that might or might not happen. It's a frustration for the Utes, as they come off an impressive 60-36 victory over Arizona State to secure 2nd in the PAC Rugby Conference.

The Utes went into that game feeling that ASU would want to open the game up and use the superior Sun Devil speed to win a high-scoring game.

"We did get dragged into that," said Utah coach Jon Law. "We want to play a more structured game. But at the same time in this game we started to see our guys make that extra pass, and go from a one pass and run kind of approach to moving the ball more."

So in a case of be careful what you wish for, Arizona State got an open, high-scoring game, and Utah won, anyway.

"Arizona State had a lot of pace and they are a good team, but our guys did well to keep the phases going a little longer and while we need better ball control, we are playing better," said Law.

Utah is in the running for a DIA playoff berth as an at-large candidate, and they pretty much locked up that invitation with the victory over Arizona State. Having beaten St. Mary's (albeit a St. Mary's without some starters), UCLA, ASU, and Arizona, and only losing to BYU, Cal, and St. Mary's, they can be pleased with their effort so far.

Now if they only knew what they were doing this Saturday.