RAPID CITY - With the high school and college football seasons beginning this weekend, so is another season: the football viewing season.

During a fall weekend at most bars and restaurants in town, people file in to watch games.

The scene is familiar to Tara Roscamp, the manager at the Sports Rock in Rapid City, who has worked in the restaurant and bar business for about eight years.

"People file in for the first games (on Sundays)," Roscamp said. "The evenings are not as busy. But Monday night is the biggest night of the week (with) Monday Night Football."

The staff at the bars turn the music off as the sounds of games dominate the air.

"Most of the people like to sit and stay until the game is over," she added, saying that there is not a lot of "table turnover" at the Sports Rock during game hours.

It is a season that is busy for home cable viewers, who have plenty of options to weigh, as well. Local cable companies have plenty to offer.

Within Rapid City's city limits, there are two main cable providers: Midcontinent Communications and Knology of the Black Hills. Cable service is also available through Qwest, which offers DirecTV service, and Dish Network serves customers in the area.

Besides the major networks - NBC, CBS and ABC - each of the local cable companies offer some of the same channels for football viewing. In their basic lineups, Knology and Midcontinent both offer Fox Sports Rocky Mountain, Fox Sports North, ESPN and ESPN2.

Both major cable companies offer a different variety in their second tiers. Knology offers ESPN Classic and ESPN News in its basic cable, but Midcontinent offers the two channels in its Preferred package, which is one tier above its basic. Knology's second-tier cable, or Digital package, offers ESPNU.

On top of its Preferred package, Midcontinent offers a special Sports and Variety package. The package includes the NFL Network, CBS College Sports Network, Fox College Sports Pacific, FCS Central, FCS Atlantic and the Big Ten Network.

Knology offers NFL Network through its standard cable package, which it claims as an advantage over Midcontinent. The NFL Network broadcasts between six to eight games late in the season, usually after Thanksgiving.

Jarrett Breuninger, the business manager at Knology of the Black Hills, said he has seen an increase in cable signups this summer, but it is hard to link the signups to football.

'The NFL Network has been a decision-maker for some of the customers," Breuninger said. Though it was a point of contention when the cable company first received NFL Network, the games on the channel are broadcast for no extra charge.

New to Knology this year is the Fox Sports North channel, which broadcasts mostly Minnesota sports. Breuninger said that certain Minnesota Vikings games can be seen on the channel.

The Big Ten Network is a channel unique to Midcontinent. During the football season, every home Big Ten football game is produced, and each team is guaranteed to make a minimum of two appearances on the network per year, with one a conference game. The network televises about 35 to 40 football games each fall and nearly all of them are available in high definition.

High-definition channels are offered by both providers for an extra cost. Sports channels offered on HD by Knology include ESPN, ESPN2, Fox Sports North and NFL Network. Midcontinent offers ESPN, ESPN2 and FSN.

For the extreme football fan, there are two other packages available.

Knology and Midcontinent also offer ESPN GamePlan, which offers about 150 games throughout the college football season. Breuninger said Knology has several offers regarding GamePlan. There is an early-bird special which ends Friday in which you can get a whole season of GamePlan for $109. After which, it costs $129 until Oct. 19, when the half-season rate of $79.95 goes into effect. Customers can also order the service by individual weekends, which costs $21.95 per Saturday.

A third cable provider locally, Qwest, offers television service through DirecTV, which has many of the same sports channels as the other local providers.

DirecTV offers a service unique to the provider called NFL Sunday Ticket. Because of an exclusive rights deal with the NFL, the satellite television company is able to offer more than 250 games throughout the season.

Sunday Ticket also offers two new features through SuperFan.Viewers can track their fantasy football teams live, as a screen will alert viewers if one of their players scored some points. Also, out-of-market football fans can view channels local to their favorite NFL team.

"It's one of the best things you can have," said Zachary, a Qwest and DirecTV sales consultant. Zachary, who is not allowed to give out his last name because of company policy, said fans can watch as many as eight games at a time on Sunday Ticket.

"I'd love to have it."

If the above options are too confusing, or if you do not want to pay for cable options, there is always the good option of taking a trip downtown.

The Sports Rock, like many restaurants and bars in town, has quite a bit for football fans. Before the football season, Bob Fuchs, the owner, loaded up on sports channels, including NFL Sunday Ticket and the ESPN GamePlan package. Fuchs is ready to accommodate all football viewers who wish to watch one of the 11 High Definition big screen televisions.

"It works out fantastically," he said about football offerings.