Differentiate between 00 and 000

So, I am doing stats for a roller derby league. And I have multiple formulas that find a players number and then counts or sums where it's found. The issue I'm having is that I have one player with the number 00 and another with the number 000. Is there anyway to tell excel that these are not just 0?

If you store as text rather than number (eg enter '00 rather than 00) then yes there are functions available that would differentiate between them *

(some functions like COUNTIF, SUMIF etc would not)