I accidently caught the last few minutes of an episode they were airing today where the coach just rips into the team after their loss.
Just watching those last few minutes really gave me a sense of how football is percieved down there in some places in the States, even high school football. The game looked like it had as many people as a CFL game (obviously not true, but surprised at the turnout nonetheless).
I went to the official Hoover High School website and was surprised to find that the football team has an entire domain registered for themselves, separately from the actual school website, with merchandise and everything.
http://www.hooverbuc.com/default.asp?FP=2895