The University of Maine has seen a rise in both fortunes and prominence for its football program in recent seasons and fans are taking notice.

So are local broadcasters.

Bangor television station WABI (Channel 5) is airing five UMaine football games live this fall. That’s a regular-season high for WABI, which is producing four games itself and taking the live feed from the season-opening Maine-Montana game in Montana from fellow CBS affiliate KPAX in Missoula.

“It’s a combination of it being a very friendly schedule and the fact that football has done so well with us lately,” said WABI program director Steve Hiltz. “It’s a great thing to have. We’re getting a lot of inquiries about football from people, especially this summer.”

It’s easy to see why WABI opted to ride the Black Bear football wave of enthusiasm this fall as interest isn’t the only thing that’s up. So are ratings and advertising support.

According to Hiltz and the TV sweeps ratings from last November, WABI’s 3 p.m. Saturday broadcast of a Maine football game drew a household rating (percentage of total households in the market turned to a specific program) of 8 and a share (percentage of viewers watching a particular program at a certain time) of 21, meaning 8 percent of TVs on were tuned in to Maine football and 21 percent of the market’s viewers were watching it. By comparison, an NBC broadcast of Notre Dame football the same afternoon drew a 1 rating and 5 share.

That gets advertisers’ attention … and money.

“I believe we’re virtually sold out for all our football broadcasts,” said Hiltz. “It hasn’t been too hard to get sponsors interested in Maine football.”

Patriots take 7

Sure, fall is still a good 41 days away and the leaves aren’t in the air yet, but football is. In and on the air, actually.

The New England Patriots kick off their preseason football schedule tonight with a game against Philadelphia at 8 p.m. Bangor ABC affiliate WVII (Ch. 7) will carry the game on a delayed basis at 11 p.m.

Boston TV station WCVB will air three Patriots preseason games live, but stations airing the game outside the Boston market must do so on a tape-delay basis due to NFL exclusivity regulations. WVII and Bangor Fox affiliate WFVX (Ch. 22) will air three Patriots preseason games in all: Friday; Saturday, Aug. 21 (11 p.m., WVII); and Thursday, Sept. 2 (10 p.m., WFVX).

“We’ll pre-empt our late night news on WVII Friday and then on that third game on WFVX to do these games because we wanted them to go on as soon as we’re allowed,” said WVII promotions manager Gene Hardin.

Hardin said this may be the fourth or fifth year they’ve aired Patriots preseason games.

“It’s something we like to get on, especially when you’re talking about the defending Super Bowl champions,” Hardin said.

Andrew Neff can be reached at 990-8205, 1-800-310-8600 or at aneff@bangordailynews.net