Rocky Mount Academy athletics director Renny Taylor knows a thing or two about good deals. With dozens of teams and hundreds of athletes to think about, he has to.
A couple of free doughnuts after lunch? Yes, thank you. Dozens of pairs of team basketball shoes for his players – signature Nikes, no less – for a fraction of the retail price? Yes, thank you. A fixed price for charter bus travel across the state, from August through May, as long as he and the Eagles do not turn to another company? Yes, thank you.
So when a charter bus company official talked with Taylor about a year ago, before gas prices jumped from about $2.50 toward $3, and now $4, and offered that rate, Taylor smiled. "Great," he said.
A fixed price to travel from Rocky Mount to Tarboro, Roanoke Rapids, Kinston, Cary and Fayetteville is about the only reason Taylor does not wince when he thinks about filling up the gas tank for his teams. The Eagles will travel thousands of miles this season – the baseall team alone is scheduled to travel 1,240 miles, more than any other Twin Counties varsity baseball team – but because of his deal, Taylor does not have to worry.
"At the beginning of the school year, (the company) said if we did all our travel with them, they would lock us in," Taylor said. "Well, he's losing money on us left and right, and I look like a genius because I locked in to that price.
"Now, next year, he'll probably kill me. But that's how it goes."
Travel is tough for any high school sports team.
Just look at the road schedules of any of a number of varsity baseball teams in the Twin Counties.
Rocky Mount High, ranked as high as No. 1 among NCHSAA 3-A teams earlier this season and in the midst of a challenging schedule, will travel 887 miles.
Falls Road Baptist, an NCCSAA 1-A team that has often has to drive more than 50 miles each way to play conference opponents, will travel 955 miles.
And Tarboro, an NCHSAA 2-A team in a conference that stretches across counties, will travel 1,060 miles.
But no team will travel more than the Eagles.
For decades, Rocky Mount Academy played in the Coastal Plains Independent Conference, a 1-A conference with a handful of schools concentrated in a pocket of Eastern North Carolina.
But two years ago, Taylor orchestrated a jump from the CPIC to the Eastern Plains Independent Conference. The EPIC is more spread out than the CPIC.
That means more miles. And more time on the road. Which can present problems.
Student-athletes have less time to study.
In a confined space like a bus, they often have trouble remaining focused. And parents cannot travel to as many road games.
"That is probably the one biggest complaint we hear," Taylor said. "But what are you going to do?"
But the Eagles need to play the games.
And they win.
Before Rocky Mount Academy baseball and girls' soccer players boarded a charter bus Tuesday afternoon for a 111-mile round trip to Kinston Arendell Parrott Academy, the baseball team was 11-5 overall, 4-1 in the EPIC and ranked No. 4 in the NCISAA.
"We do like to play tough competition," baseball coach Andy Jackson said.
"And we will travel where we have to go."
Matt LaWell can be reached at 407-9952 or mlawell@coxnc.com
