THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: First, air quality. Then, COVID. Now this

As the clock wound down and their Trojans team was comfortably ahead in last Friday's football game vs. visiting Moses Lake, members of the Post Falls High student section broke into the familiar, we've-got-this-game-locked-up chant:

"Start the bus ... start the bus."

If only they knew what went into starting the bus that day.

A COUPLE days before last week's football game, Post Falls High athletic director Craig Christensen got a call from Loren Sandhop, AD for the Moses Lake School District.

Apparently all the available bus drivers in the Moses Lake School District were busy Friday afternoon, taking kids home from school.

"They’ve been having trouble with bus drivers, and buses, so they’ve been chartering almost everything," Christensen said. "He said they can’t get a charter, can you send some buses to pick us up, bring us here, and we’ll have a bus bring us back?"

Christensen called the Post Falls School District transportation department — no buses available.

"So I thought, OK, we can move it to Saturday at 1 o’clock, then you’ll have your buses," he said.

"So I call the officials assigner, Roger Stewart … no officials.

"So I thought, are we going to have to cancel a game because of no buses and no officials? It’s a varsity game."

"It's definitely a sign of the times," said Sandhop, noting the shortage of bus drivers is "very similar to many other industries that are experiencing a shortage of workforce due to the pandemic."

"We have plenty of buses, just not enough drivers, to even get kids home from their school day, let alone take sport trips out of town," he added.

So Moses Lake uses mostly charter buses during the week, and school district buses on the weekends. They can't use district buses during the week much because with most of their road games so far away, they would have to leave before the drivers were done with their after-school routes.

SO CHRISTENSEN called Bill White, AD at fellow Inland Empire League school Coeur d'Alene.

"I thought, maybe Coeur d’Alene has someone who can help us out," Christensen said. "I didn’t know where else to go. All the charters are booked."

The seven schools in the combined 5A and 4A IEL are pretty good about looking out for each other as far as scheduling, etc.

Apparently the "etc." now applies to emergency transportation.

"So I called him (White) and he came through for us, and he saved our bacon," Christensen said. "So they sent two buses to pick up Moses Lake and bring ‘em here."

"I'm super proud of my district," said White, who praised Donda Walsh, director of transportation for the Coeur d'Alene School District, who arranged for two district bus drivers to drive the roughly 140 miles to Moses Lake, pick up the Chiefs football team and bring them to Post Falls on two buses.

Moses Lake footed the bill.

"We just happened to have enough extra drivers, because some aren't locked into routes," White said.

After they were done with their afternoon routes, two Moses Lake bus drivers were able to bring buses to Post Falls, pick the Moses Lake team up after the game and drive them home.

"I said (to White), I owe you one," Christensen said. "It was a great move by them, and we really appreciate it. We’re very thankful. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have played the game."

Moses Lake lost the game, 42-26, but obviously, playing the game was better than not, Chiefs coach Brett Jay said.

"Our issue was, we didn’t have any bus drivers; I’ve never heard of that," Jay said. "So we’re grateful that the Coeur d’Alene School District came and picked us up and took us to our game. We’re just grateful that we got to play."

Because of COVID-19, Washington high school football teams did not play last fall. Schools played an abbreviated schedule in the spring.

"It wasn’t a huge summer, we didn’t have team camp, but they worked out a lot," Jay said of his players. "They’ve been practicing since June, like everybody. So to get to these nights is everything for these guys.

"Again, we’re grateful that everyone pitched in to make this happen.

Moses Lake is scheduled to play football at Lake City on Friday, and Sandhop said the Chiefs have secured a charter bus for the trip.

Christensen, a longtime AD, thought he'd seen it all ... until last week.

"You deal with COVID, you deal with officials, you deal with buses … it’s been weird," he said. "And smoke now, too."

"Ten years ago, when you didn’t have to worry about any of that stuff, it was an easy job," he said with a bit of a laugh. "It’s gotten a lot tougher."

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter @CdAPressSports.