So I did a little research, and it turns out some schools / folks call it a revenue sport and some do not. When we were at Rutgers it was called a "Revenue Sport" to differentiate it from the sports that got no revenue from fans (everything else but football and MBB at the time). Those other sports had no admission charges and were called either "non-revenue" or "Olympic" sports, including golf, tennis, swimming, Field Hockey, lax, and yes, at the time, soccer. Times have changed.
I also saw a scholarly article that considered it a revenue sport; but conversely found several schools that call "baseball" for example a revenue sport because it is (for them). I agreed with your comment that it does not typically generate significant revenue, but the classification does apparently vary.
A lot of the physicality in the PAC is not so much the contact on the ball handler but is in going after blocks, loose balls, and the like. Which an awful lot of the ref's have no problem with. I regularly expect injuries; but as physical as our players are, I have never seen them do anything intentionally harmful and additionally (and unlike Rutgers) I don't see them playing a style that pushes the foul envelope. I don't think a review of U of A fouls would find the calls unbalanced (again, unlike (often) Rutgers). And in the PAC, an awful lot of foul calls are actually pretty ticky-tack while some really physical stuff is not called.
