In 2005, Notre Dame High School paid $300 to rent a school bus for its football trip to Grundy County. A year ago, Fighting Irish coach Charlie Wiggins paid $450 for the same trip.

Though gas prices locally have dropped recently from a little less than $4 per gallon, they’re still up almost a dollar from last year.

“I saw the other day where Roger Federer lost his No. 1 ranking for the first time in four years, and I remember thinking that gas has jumped $2 since he first got that ranking,” Notre Dame athletic director Howie Sompayrac said.

Patrons at the Bradley Central-Cleveland game last week at Bradley paid $1 more per person to get in. The story will be the same tonight when Walker Valley hosts White County.

“Walker Valley, Bradley and us are going up one dollar to six dollars, and that’s to offset the cost of travel,” Cleveland coach Danny Wilson said. “We have trips to White County and Cookeville, and you hate to sacrifice first class. That’s what we have tried to do here, but by the time you feed the kids on the way up and back, it’s probably going to cost $2,000.”

Ooltewah and Soddy-Daisy share Region 2-5A with McMinn County, Bradley Central and Knoxville area schools Oak Ridge, Farragut, William Blount and Heritage. It means two trips costing $2,000 or more per year.

“I believe those two trips cost us $4,600 last year,” Ooltewah athletic director and assistant principal Jim Jarvis said. “That’s one good gate for a lot of schools.”

The Owls’ first home game of the season netted $8,500 but was against Whites Creek from the Nashville area, and Jarvis noted that teams traveling that far usually don’t bring the number of fans a team within 50 miles would bring.

One of the two largest schools in Hamilton County along with Soddy-Daisy, Ooltewah fields full junior varsity and ninth-grade teams, so there is additional expense for those teams to travel and play.

“We don’t want to deny anyone the right to play football,” Jarvis said. “We wouldn’t make it (financially) on gate receipts. If it weren’t for the community, we wouldn’t make it.”

Soddy-Daisy also plays freshman and JV schedules.

“I tried to schedule people in town,” Trojans coach E.K. Slaughter said. “We have seven JV games and seven freshman games, and we’re going to do it. I don’t care if we have to get out and collect cans.”

Soddy-Daisy has charged $2 per car for parking at home football games, but that money went to the ROTC program. This year the school is charging $3 with the extra dollar going to the football program.

Bradley Central has not competed in the Region 2-5A freshman varsity league for several years, primarily because of the cost.

“We can’t afford the trips to Knoxville, so we’ll play JV with Chattanooga-area teams,” Bradley coach Damon Floyd said.

Cleveland, meanwhile, is looking at changing its past routine of taking two buses for JV and varsity games at an approximate cost of $150 per bus.

“We may have to revisit that and take one bus,” Wilson said. “It’s a mileage thing for us (to pay), and the drivers get paid by the hour.”

McMinn Central is unlike most in the area in that the school pays for teams’ travel.

“It hasn’t been a big deal for us, but I don’t know what will happen with gas prices going up,” Chargers coach Brandon Derrick said. “But we made a conscious decision to play locally with our junior varsity.”

Football programs are making a variety of sacrifices to counter the increased travel expense.

“You have to cut back on spending in other areas,” Rhea County coach Jason Fitzgerald said, “whether it’s adding something to the weight room or four or five pairs of shoulder pads (which run between $125 and $200 each).”

Rhea made the decision to stay at $5 for tickets because Fitzgerald is concerned about pricing families out of coming to the games.

“A family of four should not have to pay more than $20 to get in a football game,” he said. “Going up on tickets is not going to help because they’ll wind up buying two less Cokes, one less hot dog and maybe no T-shirts.”

While football gets most of Rhea’s $2 parking fees, the program splits the concessions with the band.

Rhea’s football budget runs about $65,000 annually, “but football pays all the costs whether it is officials, buying or repairing a mower, the electric bill, the equipment, security and field paint,” Fitzgerald said. “If it has to do with football, it comes out of my budget.”

Polk County is among the other schools holding ticket prices at $5.

“And if you come by school and get them before the game, they’re $4,” Polk coach Derrick Davis said. “This is a small town and there isn’t a whole lot to do. ... Gas prices are a burden, and we probably won’t buy travel shirts this year, but I want people in the stands. You have a family that works all week and they want to come out on a Friday night and watch football.

“I’m going to have to watch what I spend. I had hoped to get new jerseys next year, but I may have to wait. I know a dollar isn’t much, but you bring a family of five to a game and we start going to $6 or $7 per person, it’s hard to afford, and I don’t want to make it any harder on our fans. We have a great community here and we have people that pitch in. It seems like when things get tight, we always have found a way.”

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