Click here to see a video the NAIA National Football Championship Game press conference.
Planning to hold a national championship game in under a year takes dedicated people to produce results and accomplish goals.
The Executive Committee for the 2008-2009 National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics National Football Championship games believes they’ve found two such people to get them on the right track.
The group announced Friday that Bob Berry and Bill Peterson will co-chair its Host Committee for the two title games.
Berry is a partner in the law firm of Brinson, Askew, Berry, Seigler, Richardson and Davis. Peterson is the athletic director at Shorter College. The NAIA will hold both championship games in Rome at Barron Stadium.
The Executive Committee is comprised of representatives from Rome, Floyd County, and Shorter, the three entities which joined together to secure the NAIA bid.
Berry and Peterson will begin immediately to address early concerns such as organization and sponsorships.
“Our current emphasis is to find sponsors that are willing to support this game and our community,” Berry said. “We know it will be done and we look forward to their best championship game ever.”
The 2008 and 2009 National Championship games were awarded to Shorter College and Rome-Floyd County earlier this month. The 2008 game will be played on Dec. 20, and the 2009 game will be played on Dec. 19.
Within the next 30 days, the duo is planning to develop individual chairs on the committee that will serve as vice presidents of the organization and help coordinate aspects of the championship week.
“We want to get as many people as possible involved in this,” Berry said. “There is going to be a lot of opportunities for volunteer help and we’ll have as many people as it makes sense to have come out.”
Various subdivisions, such as stadium operations, transportation and hospitality, will all be addressed by the committee.
“The great thing about Rome is we have people who know how to put on big events,” Berry said.
As far as sponsorships, the committee will be looking quickly at the possibility of identifying and securing a headlining game sponsor.
“It is a vision of Bill’s, and I agree, that we want to make this like the BCS championship for the NAIA,” Berry said, referring to the Bowl Championship Subdivision title game for NCAA schools.
“Those are the very first major items of business. Then we’ll start putting together more detailed needs once we’ve done that,” Berry added.
“December will be here before you know it.”
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