In an era when athletes make millions of dollars in contracts and endorsement deals, a general opinion could be made that playing just for love of a sport is a thing of the past.

For the Western roller hockey team, that love is a thing of the present.

Started five years ago, the Topper roller hockey team is one of the many club sports available to students.

Senior team captain Eric Diego helped establish the club in his freshman year in 2002.

“We’re constantly showing WKU spirit,” he said. “And we try to get out and try to put our name out there for places who have never really heard of us.”

The team travels an average of 25 times a season for road games, with travel ranging as far west as St. Louis and as far east as Raleigh, N.C.

With no true collegiate roller hockey league in south-central Kentucky, they must play in the Warren County Inline Hockey League (WCIHL). The league has two other adult teams, shorter time periods of play and weaker competition than they play when facing more established collegiate teams.

The team makes seven trips during its season to St. Louis for conference play in the Great Plains Collegiate Inline Hockey League (GPCIHL). The conference features club teams such as Kansas State, Missouri, Missouri State, Illinois and Middle Tennessee State.

The majority of those teams’ players participate on scholarship, unlike Western’s players.

“The parents always come out,” senior Matt Hunter said. “They travel to St. Louis for our conference tournament.”

According to Diego, who also serves as vice president of Sports Club Council, the overall sports club budget is $10,000, with roller hockey receiving $2,000 in total school contributions. This money must help pay for uniforms, equipment, travel, hotel rooms during away games and rink expenses.

Much of the funding comes from the team’s own pockets. They also run local youth hockey camps, contribute 400 hours of community service, serve as ushers at University of Louisville and Kentucky sporting events and work on-campus sporting events for Centerplate Concessions at Western events.

The team’s dedication to raising money and helping the community recently earned it Western’s club sport of the year award for the second time in three years.

“We jump through a lot of hoops,” Diego said. “We have to make the National Collegiate Roller Hockey Association happy, we have to make Warren County Inline (League) happy. We also have to make Bowling Green Parks and Recreation happy and then Western. The main thing we want is recognition.”

Though the team is now having trouble recruiting future players, senior Brandon Payne said the team would love to have a rink built near campus.

“We’d love to come back in four or five years and see that the program is still going strong,” he said. “That is our main goal. We’d like to have a rink and noteriety for being here.”

Reach David Harten at sports@wkuherald.com.