Fans of other Mountain West Conference schools have joined some University of Hawaii followers in expressing disappointment over the cessation of live streaming of Rainbow Warriors football games.

It has been a topic of conversation on radio this week in Fresno, Calif., where UH will play the Bulldogs on Saturday.

“I’ve been bringing up on-air this streaming embargo by Oceanic for several weeks now,” Tony D’addato, host of a popular afternoon show on ESPN 940 radio, said in an email. “It is what it is,” he told listeners.

Spokesmen for New Mexico, Air Force and San Jose State said they have also fielded calls, as has UH, athletic director David Matlin said.

Frank Mercogliano UNM’s assistant athletic director, said the school encouraged Albuquerque TV stations to buy the feed from Oceanic, but because the game kicked off at 10 p.m. Mountain time, there were no buyers.

A Las Vegas Station did purchase the Oceanic feed for the Rebels’ Oct. 15 game at Aloha Stadium.

Live streaming of many of UH’s other sports, including women’s volleyball, has resumed in the Big West Conference. But football may take a while, the MWC said.

Javan Hedlund, MWC associate commissioner, said in an email, “… the MWC has received some feedback on this topic. It has been discussed by the conference athletics directors and, UH, MWC and Oceanic are continuing to work collaboratively toward a solution for next season.”

At issue has been Oceanic’s ability to protect the exclusivity of its pay-per-view content, for which it guarantees UH $2.3 million per year.

Prior to this season UH games carried by Oceanic, the Hawaii rights holder, had been live streamed on the mainland relying on an ability to block internet protocol addresses in Hawaii as a way to keep non-subscribers in the state from accessing the PPV games without paying.

This allowed UH fans living on the mainland, fans of opponents, families of players and prospective recruits to follow the teams without paying for PPV or subscriptions.

But officials said some people in Hawaii apparently found ways to circumvent geo-fencing, as the geographically based restrictions are known, and accessed the games.

Oceanic airs UH football games free the following day in Hawaii.

“The reality is that virtually every Mountain West football game is broadcast on a linear and/or digital platform (i.e., ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPNews, ESPN3, CBSSN, Root Sports, Campus Insiders/Mountain West Network,” Hedlund said. “For the small handful of games which are not produced or for those where we would like to extend distribution beyond the base platform, all MW member institutions are encouraged (but not required) to stream their games.”

Meanwhile, the Big West Conference, where most of UH’s sports compete, announced recently the resumption of live video streaming of OC Sports broadcasts this season for women’s volleyball, men’s and women’s basketball, women’s soccer, beach volleyball, baseball and softball home games.

The Big West said this means, “viewers outside of Hawaii can watch the stream through www.BigWest.TV. Viewers within the state can watch the stream through www.OCSports.tv only if they are Oceanic customers. Non-Oceanic customers can’t view the stream within Hawaii. All UH road games for those sports will continue to be available to everyone on BigWest.tv, free of charge.”