In the past, Good Hope High football fans have always traveled well.

It didn’t matter where Good Hope was playing, the team’s fans made sure their presence was felt.

That could change this season. And if Good Hope’s fanbase isn’t able to create a strong presence this season, Chris Moss will understand.

The Raiders coach knows it’s just economics.

Gas prices have risen considerably in recent years, and almost everyone is feeling the impact — including high school football teams and the fans that follow them.

After last season, the Alabama High School Athletic Association realigned its football regions. And with the change, Good Hope finds itself in a tough situation.

This year, Good Hope has five road games — traveling outside Cullman County three times.

While the amount of road games isn’t unusual, the distance Good Hope will travel this season is far from normal. The Raiders have road games at Winfield and Hamilton — two schools that are located in Marion County, which is near the Mississippi state line.

“It’s going to be tough,” Moss said. “It’s tough on the school and it’s tough on the fans. I was talking to Dr. (Anita) Kilpatrick earlier this week, and she said it was going to cost us $1,400 just to travel to football games. That’s a big number for travel.”

Good Hope isn’t the only local football team that will log a high amount of highway miles this season. Hanceville has to travel to Winfield, while Cullman and Fairview both have multiple road games that are more than one hour away.

“It’s not an easy situation,” Moss said. “For the fans that travel, they have to pay for gas, tickets and food. That can get expensive.

“On top of that, it’s expensive for the schools. We have to pay $1.50 per mile when we take a bus. With these long road games, it’s getting tough.”

Long road trips for high school football games hasn’t always been a problem in Alabama. Before the AHSAA implemented the region format, playoff berths were decided by area games.

With the old format, teams were placed in four team areas, meaning the AHSAA determined who three opponents would be.

This meant coaches could use the seven other open dates to fill the schedule with geographical rivals — which typically brought in more money at the gate.

But with the new format, the AHSAA places every team in an eight team region — meaning most coaches only have three open dates to work with.

For example, several Cullman County football teams won’t play each other this season. In the past, that wasn’t the case.

The region format has also affected Cullman’s ability to schedule natural rivals — especially for the next two years.

Since Cullman has been placed in a nine-team region, head coach Mark Britton only had two open dates to work with. This means the Bearcats won’t be playing rivals Hartselle or Hanceville this year.

“This is the first time since I’ve been at Cullman as a player and coach that we haven’t played Hartselle,” Britton said. “But what can you do? The (AHSAA) put us in this region, so that’s who we have to play. You just have to deal with it.”

Having the AHSAA determine schedules has caused West Point to lose one game off its schedule this year. Since West End-Birmingham closed its doors this fall, that means the Warriors will only have nine games on their schedule for the next two years.

“It’s an open date we can’t fill,” West Point coach Michael Simmons said. “Since every other team in the state will be playing region games that week, the only team we could’ve picked up was in Florida. And that was just too far to go.”

During this year’s All-Star Sports Week, it was rumored that AHSAA officials were thinking about dumping the region format during it’s next realignment. According to the rumors, the teams in the lower classifications would go back to the old area format.

According to Moss, changing back to the area format would help teams schedule more natural rivals.

“If they did that, we would be able to play everyone in Cullman County,” Moss said. “It would also cut out a lot of these long road games.

“The only problem would be filling your schedule up. With the region format, we only have to schedule three games. But that’s something we could get past.”

Even though the AHSAA has not officially announced a change, the organization has addressed the high cost of fuel and long road trips to playoff games.

When the playoffs begin this year, teams in the closest two regions will play in the first three rounds of the playoffs — eliminating long road trips until the semifinals.