Doesn't exposure usually have to be earned? Should the networks say, "hey, we have no idea if anyone is gonna watch this, but it's a women's sports, so let's put it on prime time!" That would be like giving a completely unknown band a stadium tour and saying, "let's see how ticket sales go!" No one wants to lose their ass on an unknown entity. Heck, the NBA subsidized the WNBA, yet that league has still be a total flop.
In a way, sports is not all that dissimilar from music. The money goes where the interest is. I am sure there are some here who think it's unfair that women like Beyonce and Taylor Swift get to do stadium tours and makes millions and millions, while our beloved Dream Theater, a group of men, have to play 2,000 seat (give or take) venues to scrape out a good living, but, again, that's the marketplace to which Bill alluded.