News - Local/State

Tuesday, Dec. 02, 2008

Trek to game might strain fans' wallets

3-hour drive to Clemson on Friday night likely to keep many from going

You live in Rock Hill all your life and work in a machine shop or an office in a brutal economy where 19 people, broke and desperate, are in line for your job.

You get paid when you work -- and not when you don't.

And, like so many, you love high school football in this hard-nosed, scratched-knuckle city.

Now, two teams from your hometown -- Northwestern and South Pointe -- will play Friday night for the state Class AAAA Division II title.

Three hours away in Clemson -- in a huge, 75,000-seat stadium, most of which will be empty for the 8 p.m. start.

Why not, then, have the game right here in Rock Hill at District Three Stadium? The schools are separated by about a seven- minute drive.

The stadium with the brand new, almost-million-dollar scoreboard and artificial turf that you, the taxpayer, paid for, which seats about 10,000 people.

Anybody local who wanted to go could go and not miss any work. The hoopla would be a sight people in this football-mad city would talk about forever.

It could happen. Theoretically.

I called Jerome Singleton, commissioner of the South Carolina High School League, the governing body for schoolboy sports, on Monday to find out if moving the game here could happen.

His answer: "Is that what Rock Hill wants?"

I said I had no idea, I was just asking as a fan three hours from Clemson who -- if I am not working covering the game -- will have to travel and give up work time to go.

Some fans will have to figure out how to get out of work early just to get there. Or take time off from work -- and that means money lost at a time when nobody has a dollar to spare.

Maybe pull the kids out of school early. Or take a vacation day and spend part of the Christmas money.

All of the above applies to Rhonda Burris-Jackson.

She's working four 10-hour shifts through Thursday so she can go Friday, and her husband is working third-shift so he can go, too. Their son, Breon, wears No. 11 as a wide receiver for South Pointe.

Hundreds of people will be in the same boat, rooting for one team or the other -- maybe thousands. Burris-Jackson was on the computer Monday trying to find a reasonably priced hotel room for Friday night.

"I'm excited about the game, just not about it being so far away on a Friday night," she said. "We have worked it out, but some people can't get time off for games."

From where Singleton sits, it's worth it for the kids.

Most of the players on the field Friday night will never play college football, he said, so having the chance to play for a state title in a huge college stadium is "memorable."

"If you ask these kids, would you rather play the state championship at District Three Stadium or South Pointe's stadium, you and I both know what the answer would be."

The kids want to play at Death Valley, Singleton said. "These opportunities don't come every day."

He's right. Playing in the big stadium is an honor and a privilege.

That was true at USC's Williams-Brice Stadium, too, where the state title games have been played for years. A lot closer than Clemson for most of the state.

Advantage, Singleton -- but just barely.

What about all that travel? I asked. Singleton said road teams travel all year and through the playoffs. True. But ever see the size of road crowds from three hours away on a Friday night? Small to tiny. This will be a state title match-up, but still, it is a work day a long way from home.

Advantage, me.

Why not play all the games on Saturday? I asked. Chester gets to play Saturday afternoon for the Class AAA championship. Singleton said playing four games on Saturday would mean starting too early -- at 11 a.m. -- and finishing too late -- close to midnight. I say 11 a.m. is not too early, especially when the alternative is real people losing work time and school time.

Advantage, me.

Why were the games moved to Clemson this year anyway? Like most things in this state: politics.

In 2006, state politicians led by Rep. Dan Cooper, R-Piedmont, urged the S.C. High School League by legislative resolution -- translation: "Do it, because we say so!" -- to move the annual games from right smack in the middle of the state.