There’s more than one way to get onto the field of a college football game.

I was curious about one of the entry level jobs of officiating, the equivalent of dishwasher at a restaurant.

So I filed my formal application with the guy in charge, Matt Sumstine. He also heads up training of high school officials, does training videos and is an experienced college referee.

Me: "Hey, Matt, can I be a ball boy at the Hawaii Bowl?"

Matt: "OK."

And so I found myself with five other local middle-aged men and four more age-appropriate volunteers from Fresno State and Rice, ready to dispense pigskins to the zebras at Aloha Stadium on Christmas Eve.

That adds up to 10 ball boys, but a few minutes before kickoff Sumstine said we were down to nine.

"One of them failed the drug test," he deadpanned, before assuring me nine would be more than enough for the job.

At most college games it’s a detail of six. But at a bowl game, you never really know if the teams are going to bring their own so you make sure to have backup ready.

Van Peterson, Ted Biesecker, Scott Smith and Aaron Orsatti are all local high school officials and knew what they were doing. They negotiated the crowded sidelines of big, fire-breathing men (and that’s just the coaches) with ease, often moving against the traffic.

They were just there for fun, but their on-field experience told them when to be ready to move out of the way of a play, and when to be ready to toss a ball to an official.

I was part of the backup, and that’s good because I failed miserably when I got my shot. While I was asking Dillon Breaux how to spell his name, the son of the Rice equipment manager whipped a fresh ball to a beckoning side judge.

Hey, I was supposed to do that!

"Yeah, you gotta be ready," Breaux said, trying to make me feel better as I pondered whether to take someone else’s ball and go home. "That’s OK, it takes some practice."

Anthony Tamez, a Fresno State junior, is a Bulldogs team manager, and also served as a ball boy. His advice was to keep your eye on the men in stripes. They’ll let you know when they need a ball.

Each team likes to have their own for a couple of reasons: In college football, the game balls are usually provided by the teams. So each team wants to make sure it uses its own when kicking and on offense. And they also want to leave the stadium with as many as they bring. It’s not like the NFL, where a new ball is used for each play of the Super Bowl.

Well, after it was made clear that I didn’t have the necessary attention span to give a ball to an official, someone came up with the idea to put me on the chain gang.

Somehow, I managed to handle the down marker for two series without tripping over the chain or giving either team an extra offensive play, thanks to the instruction and patience of Darin Pacheco.

Darin and his brother, Dino, have been members of the six-person chain gang at University of Hawaii and bowl games here since the early 1980s.

"What’s cool is you can be shoulder-to-shoulder, side-by-side with players like Reggie Bush, Ben Roethlisberger," Dino said. "You can tell your kids about it."

Like everyone else on the sidelines, the most important thing is to pay attention so you don’t become part of a pileup. Followed closely by do your job and have fun.

"I thought (officiating) would be a cool thing to do and I’ve never regretted it," said Peterson, who played varsity football at Damien. "There’s the camaraderie, but it’s also about helping out. You do it for the kids because without us they can’t have the games."

Sumstine is looking for prospective high school football officials on Oahu. He can be reached at RefereeClinic.com/HHSAA or (808) 927-8665.

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. His blog is at hawaiiwarriorworld.com/quick-reads.