No TV for state football > Economics sink viewers’ hopes

Much to the chagrin of hopeful football fans in Bangor, Winslow, and Pittsfield, none of this weekend’s state championship football games will be broadcast on local television.

Even more distressing for local fans of high school football, Saturday afternoon will mark just the second time in the last 13 years that Bangor TV station WABI (Channel 5) has not aired a state championship football game.

“Last year, the decision was made we weren’t going to do the state championship football,” said WABI program director Steve Hiltz. “It had to do, more or less, with the other obligations we have with University of Maine sports and we basically didn’t have the resources and time to keep doing this every year.”

Hiltz further explained that much of the decision had to do with production costs accrued from the resources and manpower involved in addition to the relatively low return on that investment the last few years.

“Every year we’ve been doing this and it hasn’t worked out to our advantage, so with the workload and the financial outlay being what it was, we said, ‘Let’s just let it go this year,’ so of course Bangor stepped up and it happened this year,” said WABI program director Steve Hiltz.

Hiltz said location is a big factor in deciding whether to air a game.

“Travel cost is what really kills us, putting people up in hotels and paying the overtime and transporting equipment,” he said.

Last year, the Class A game was played at the University of Maine’s Morse Field, a factor which significantly decreased WABI’s expenses. And if it had been in Orono again this year?

“Then maybe we might have decided to do it, but I couldn’t say for sure,” Hiltz said. “It would have increased the chances with less expense involved, but it wouldn’t necessarily have been a done deal.”

For the last five years, WABI and Lewiston’s WPME (Ch. 35) have aired the Class A games jointly. WABI handled production and broadcast duties while WPME paid a fee to air WABI’s broadcast in the southern Maine market, helping WABI offset its costs.

Hiltz said the decision not to do a game this fall is a reflection of the local market, but not necessarily a sign that local sports broadcasts of this type are on the verge of disappearing.

“In the industry in general, live programming, let alone sports, is starting to go in a different direction,” Hiltz said. “We’ve certainly cut back on what we’ve done. It’s a marketwide trend.”

Other Bangor station officials echoed some of Hiltz’s concerns.

“To a certain extent, televised sports are always kind of a crap-shoot. It’s always a lot of gambling,” said WLBZ 2 president and general manager Judy Horan, whose station hasn’t aired a high school football game since the 1995 Maine Shrine Lobster Bowl. “Also, a lot of our stations don’t have as much free time on our broadcast schedules these days.”

Both Horan and Hiltz further pointed to the increased competition for viewers’ attention from cable and satellite TV.

As far as viewer concerns about further TV erosion affecting Eastern Maine tournament basketball coverage, Hiltz said he sees no cause for worry.

“Basketball is a different animal because the sport itself is so popular, people want to watch the playoffs whether their team’s involved or not. Football is a little more regional, interest-wise,” he said.

Hiltz said football coverage plans will be re-evaluated again later this year.

“We’re not currently planning to do a football championship game, but a lot of what we’ve done over the years has been stuff we’ve decided to do a few weeks before the event,” Hiltz explained.

Meanwhile, calls from hopeful fans inquiring about possible game coverage continue to trickle in.

“We’ve had a few calls from people wondering about it and they’ve been disappointed, but they understand the reasons,” Hiltz said. “We’re as disappointed as anyone we’re not doing this game.”