Reflection on the BC Premier, BC Club Finals – Look Ahead to 2026-27
Now that the club finals are over a chance to review the season, the finals event and look ahead to next season.
What worked
The club finals event from a live stream perspective was for the most part well done. The BCRU had a live camera and announcers on both fields for all seven matches. They didn’t use their Veo Ai system which is like watching rugby through a a traffic camera. It would have been nice to have the rosters shown on screen at the beginning of the match, but some of the announcers mentioned they didn’t have the rosters, we’ll cover rosters later.
During the season at least three clubs had consistent live streams with commentary teams, UBC, UVic and Westshore. UBC had the best live stream considering camera work, commentary and stream consistency. UVic and Westshore deserve kudos for their efforts and productions, the UVic team even covered some away games.
The weather for the most part co-operated and there were very few weather related match cancellations and postponements. Some clubs took precautions and booked turf stadiums in anticipation of “high-risk” weekends.
Most clubs posted their rosters on social media on Friday, some emailed us directly, much appreciated.
The results system, for the most part, worked. The referees update the scores post match directly. Sometimes they get the scores reversed, some times they forget to enter bonus point info but Chris Assmus is usually available to make corrections. We’ll cover this topic again in the Wish List for Next Season category.
Wish List for Next Season
The women’s Premier needs to be better organized. We’ve seen a number of issues over the last few years, this year Ravens registered a team but couldn’t field a team in the fall and then all their games in the spring were categorized as exhibition. They still showed in the standings, the exhibition results still showed in the standings until the BCRU staff did a clean up. It made the posted standings inaccurate for most of the season. Abbotsford opted out midway through the season, again it messed up the standings. The BCRU changed the playoff structure to reflect there were only 5 competitive teams, everyone made the playoffs. Seattle being the outlier. The years before there were two Thunderbirds teams in Premier, one only played half a season and got in the playoffs, players showed up in both team rosters. Please sort out the league before it begins next season, Thunderbirds get one team, if the Ravens can’t 100% commit to Premier put them in Div 1, if there are only 5 consistent teams so be it. Kudos to the Meralomas for making the jump from Div 1 to Premier and making the semis.
Live streaming, we have three Premier clubs stepping up, Burnaby used to, can we get four or five for next season? The BCRU can help by providing incentives, a business model. It gives the players world wide visibility (including selectors and coaches), it promotes the clubs, it promotes the club sponsors, it promotes BC Rugby to the world.
Rosters, I was really disappointed the Thunderbirds, 5 time women’s Premier champions, couldn’t publish a roster for the finals. Again the BCRU needs to set some standards, rosters published 24 hours before kick off. Some clubs are great at that, it should be a requisite for being in the Premier. The Rules of Competition state, “Men’s and Women’s Premier League Teams must submit a Team Sheet no later than 10am the day prior to each scheduled Match.” It would be good if the BCRU enforced this and made the information media accessible.
Results, the ref system of updating is probably the most cost effective but there should be BCRU staff available to double check accuracy and make corrections on Saturday. How is mainstream media, newspapers, etc going to take rugby seriously if you can’t be 100% sure of the results and standings on Saturday evening for Sunday publication?
The BC Premier needs to be the flagship of BC Rugby, stop treating it the same as the lower divisions. It should have higher standards in publicity, roster/result reporting. The Coastal Cup showed how to do it right during its brief history, its own website, live stream consistency, result and match reports provided in a timely fashion. The BC Premier needs its own Commissioner to set standards and organize the competition in a professional manner.
Unknowns for Next Season
There’s talk of three teams possibly moving up to Premier, Rowers, Bayside, Langley. Currently the Rules of Competition state:
- Number of Teams – a maximum of 12 Clubs may be permitted entry.
- A Club must enter and compete in Men’s Premier League, Men’s Division 1, Boy’s U16 or U18 and an Age Grade Girls or Senior Women program.
- Any new Club wishing to enter the Men’s Premier League must have run two men’s teams for the previous two seasons, without recording any defaults for their highest division team.
Rowers had two men’s teams in the finals, Div 1 and 3, they look good there. They have a Div 2 women’s team, do they have a U16 or U18 team, not sure. Bayside have a Div 1 and Div 3 men’s team and a women’s Div 1 team, they have U16/U18 teams. Langley have a Div 1 and Div 3 men’s team and a women’s Div 1 team, they have U16/U18 teams. It will be interesting to see what happens, I’m not sure when the application deadline is this year, I’ll try to find out.
The Pacific Pride, what happens with them, are they running again next season? They were cut back to one match per team this season, it was almost an exhibition season for them. Is it a case of going, going, gone or will they be integrated back to a full season, if they’re still around. If the limit is 12 teams, then if three come in, that’s 12 without the Pride.
Any tinkering with the import rule this season, it seems to be changing on a constant basis. There were specific limits, then no limits, now maximum of seven imports per Premier and Div 1 team.
Those are my thoughts for a Sunday editorial, post finals weekend. Monday is the time to start planning for the 2026-27 season.