The unofficial online home for fans of the UAB Blazers. Part of Collegiate Sports Nation (CSN).

(12-04-2016 08:37 PM)blazers9911 Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:58 PM)randy22263 Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:22 PM)Shrack Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:19 PM)BamaScorpio69 Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:09 PM)Shrack Wrote:  UABs only averaged 4000-6000 MBB fans for at least 15 years. It's not exactly news. Many of the Auburn fans there were likely supportive of UAB, unless we're playing Auburn. Just like how plenty of Alabama fans are only secondary UAB fans. That's how it is.

Attendance goes up when you win consistently and beat good programs. That's what happened when Mike Anderson came in. Went from 3800 to 5000-6000 more regularly after we started winning and getting back to the NCAAs consistently. You want to start losing the sidewalk fans? Lose games to bad teams and you see about how large the hardcore UAB MBB fanbase is: 3000-4000 range.

And it's a combo of a lot of things. We now play in a terrible basketball conference. At a minimum, that will drag out attendance average down 500-1000 a year.

We don't have 8000 pure MBB UAB fans who are going to shutout opposing schools from buying tickets if their names are Auburn or Alabama. If we were playing Memphis at home, etc, those sidewalk Auburn/Alabama fans would be UAB fans for the night and such.

That's how it is right now whether anyone like's it or not

The only way to create pure UAB fans is to win for years at a time at the highest level.

Like UAB did under Bartow. Unfortunately those days are gone and UAB is now a stepping stone job for up and coming coaches or retreads. The conference we're in will always be a detriment to this program. No one in Birmingham is going to get excited about playing MTSU, WKU, Marshall, etc. in basketball. It is what it is.

Exactly. Only thing you can do is win consistently and get back to the NCAAs most years. We had momentum going last year and we bombed. Your average joe fan wants to see their local team beating top 50 teams, not losing to 200 RPI teams at home. Otherwise they will not show up.

These are good points. It's funny how after a sellout crowd we are having this conversation. I really feel we are simply deflecting the real concern: we just lost to Auburn two straight years when we were probably a better team. If we had won last night no one would have mentioned the number of Auburn fans. We are looking at losing all four games in this series to them and that scares the crap out of us. We are not the program we once was. We all know that. Whether we can reach that level again is the question. Our current path would suggest no.

I was going to have this conversation regardless. It is absolutely horrendous that our season ticket holders a) don't show up to this game and b) give their tickets to auburn fans. That is unacceptabtle and I hope it is addressed.

That part was bad. A part of the problem is a decent amount of the G&G room tickets are corporate tickets that largely go unused. But at the same time we need the money generated from the sale of those tickets.

(12-04-2016 08:25 PM)hooverblazer Wrote:  We don't need to reduce the size of Bartow. Just last season we had the following attendance in CUSA games:

6835 vs North Texas
6664 vs FIU
6211 vs FAU
7190 vs Marshall
7510 vs WKU

Those are strong crowds against teams most people in Birmingham don't care about. The only capacity reduction I'd be ok with would be removing ~500 seats by adding suites.

The problem is we still are a young university in comparison to UA, AU, and most colleges out there. It takes time to build a fan base and we just have to keep adding to it year by year with more graduates and more new students. Also, because of our relative youth and the dominance of UA and AU in this state, we have a lot of fans in the "I support UAB unless they're playing AU/UA" camp and last night was one of those instances.

We can have solid attendance like last year, but we have to win regularly (see 26 win season) and make the NCAA tournament. However, making the tournament now is much harder than it was in the days of Mike Anderson because of the weakening of our conference.

BINGO...people were coming last season to see UAB play...regardless of the opponent because we were piling up the wins...and I agree overall CUSA is way too big and watered down...but we still have quality programs that have won before...UAB, Old Dominion, Charlotte and Western Kentucky - these teams were with us in the old Sun Belt and bring familiarity...just win baby

(12-04-2016 06:35 PM)Shrack Wrote:  Allowing teams to shoot 38.2% from 3 on us. Take out the expected 330-360RPI teams (ARPB and AAMU) and we're looking at teams going

Furman: 15-24 (62.5%)
Troy: 7-33 (21.2%)
Kansas: 12-24 (44.4%)
GW: 8-27 (29.6%)
SMC: 13-26 (50%)
AUB: 11-27 (40.7%)

66-161 (41%)

Without Troy (270 RPI): 59-128 (46.1%)

So for the 5 difficult games (top 200 expected RPI) we've faced. Teams are shooting 46% from the 3 against us. That's garbage

That's half of the problem. We aren't even coming close to trading 3's with other teams. As a team, UAB is shooting 3's at a pathetic 31.6%. That's bad enough to be ranked 259th in the country in 3's.

We are an excellent free throw shooting team. Yet we missed some critical free throws down the stretch last night.

(12-04-2016 10:10 PM)KevMo4UAB Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:35 PM)Shrack Wrote:  Allowing teams to shoot 38.2% from 3 on us. Take out the expected 330-360RPI teams (ARPB and AAMU) and we're looking at teams going

Furman: 15-24 (62.5%)
Troy: 7-33 (21.2%)
Kansas: 12-24 (44.4%)
GW: 8-27 (29.6%)
SMC: 13-26 (50%)
AUB: 11-27 (40.7%)

66-161 (41%)

Without Troy (270 RPI): 59-128 (46.1%)

So for the 5 difficult games (top 200 expected RPI) we've faced. Teams are shooting 46% from the 3 against us. That's garbage

That's half of the problem. We aren't even coming close to trading 3's with other teams. As a team, UAB is shooting 3's at a pathetic 31.6%. That's bad enough to be ranked 259th in the country in 3's.

We are an excellent free throw shooting team. Yet we missed some critical free throws down the stretch last night.

Who would have thought Tosin would be the guy who was money from the stripe? He still makes me nervous every time he has to put the ball on the floor or make a pass, but to me he looks like the player who has made the most noticeable improvements this season.

(12-04-2016 10:15 PM)BlazintheATL Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 10:10 PM)KevMo4UAB Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:35 PM)Shrack Wrote:  Allowing teams to shoot 38.2% from 3 on us. Take out the expected 330-360RPI teams (ARPB and AAMU) and we're looking at teams going

Furman: 15-24 (62.5%)
Troy: 7-33 (21.2%)
Kansas: 12-24 (44.4%)
GW: 8-27 (29.6%)
SMC: 13-26 (50%)
AUB: 11-27 (40.7%)

66-161 (41%)

Without Troy (270 RPI): 59-128 (46.1%)

So for the 5 difficult games (top 200 expected RPI) we've faced. Teams are shooting 46% from the 3 against us. That's garbage

That's half of the problem. We aren't even coming close to trading 3's with other teams. As a team, UAB is shooting 3's at a pathetic 31.6%. That's bad enough to be ranked 259th in the country in 3's.

We are an excellent free throw shooting team. Yet we missed some critical free throws down the stretch last night.

Who would have thought Tosin would be the guy who was money from the stripe? He still makes me nervous every time he has to put the ball on the floor or make a pass, but to me he looks like the player who has made the most noticeable improvements this season.

Tosin is most definitely the most improved.

(12-04-2016 10:15 PM)BlazintheATL Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 10:10 PM)KevMo4UAB Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:35 PM)Shrack Wrote:  Allowing teams to shoot 38.2% from 3 on us. Take out the expected 330-360RPI teams (ARPB and AAMU) and we're looking at teams going

Furman: 15-24 (62.5%)
Troy: 7-33 (21.2%)
Kansas: 12-24 (44.4%)
GW: 8-27 (29.6%)
SMC: 13-26 (50%)
AUB: 11-27 (40.7%)

66-161 (41%)

Without Troy (270 RPI): 59-128 (46.1%)

So for the 5 difficult games (top 200 expected RPI) we've faced. Teams are shooting 46% from the 3 against us. That's garbage

That's half of the problem. We aren't even coming close to trading 3's with other teams. As a team, UAB is shooting 3's at a pathetic 31.6%. That's bad enough to be ranked 259th in the country in 3's.

We are an excellent free throw shooting team. Yet we missed some critical free throws down the stretch last night.

Who would have thought Tosin would be the guy who was money from the stripe? He still makes me nervous every time he has to put the ball on the floor or make a pass, but to me he looks like the player who has made the most noticeable improvements this season.

Tosin is most definitely the most improved.

yet Tosin, who is so often the BIGGEST man on the floor, consistently shoots the little 2-footer (and too often MISSING) instead of dunking the ball. He rarely uses his size to his advantage.

(12-04-2016 06:58 PM)randy22263 Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:22 PM)Shrack Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:19 PM)BamaScorpio69 Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 06:09 PM)Shrack Wrote:  UABs only averaged 4000-6000 MBB fans for at least 15 years. It's not exactly news. Many of the Auburn fans there were likely supportive of UAB, unless we're playing Auburn. Just like how plenty of Alabama fans are only secondary UAB fans. That's how it is.

Attendance goes up when you win consistently and beat good programs. That's what happened when Mike Anderson came in. Went from 3800 to 5000-6000 more regularly after we started winning and getting back to the NCAAs consistently. You want to start losing the sidewalk fans? Lose games to bad teams and you see about how large the hardcore UAB MBB fanbase is: 3000-4000 range.

And it's a combo of a lot of things. We now play in a terrible basketball conference. At a minimum, that will drag out attendance average down 500-1000 a year.

We don't have 8000 pure MBB UAB fans who are going to shutout opposing schools from buying tickets if their names are Auburn or Alabama. If we were playing Memphis at home, etc, those sidewalk Auburn/Alabama fans would be UAB fans for the night and such.

That's how it is right now whether anyone like's it or not

The only way to create pure UAB fans is to win for years at a time at the highest level.

Like UAB did under Bartow. Unfortunately those days are gone and UAB is now a stepping stone job for up and coming coaches or retreads. The conference we're in will always be a detriment to this program. No one in Birmingham is going to get excited about playing MTSU, WKU, Marshall, etc. in basketball. It is what it is.

Exactly. Only thing you can do is win consistently and get back to the NCAAs most years. We had momentum going last year and we bombed. Your average joe fan wants to see their local team beating top 50 teams, not losing to 200 RPI teams at home. Otherwise they will not show up.

These are good points. It's funny how after a sellout crowd we are having this conversation. I really feel we are simply deflecting the real concern: we just lost to Auburn two straight years when we were probably a better team. If we had won last night no one would have mentioned the number of Auburn fans. We are looking at losing all four games in this series to them and that scares the crap out of us. We are not the program we once was. We all know that. Whether we can reach that level again is the question. Our current path would suggest no.

Bingo

Third best team in the state.

(12-05-2016 06:59 AM)CourtsideBlazer Wrote:  yet Tosin, who is so often the BIGGEST man on the floor, consistently shoots the little 2-footer (and too often MISSING) instead of dunking the ball. He rarely uses his size to his advantage.

Absolutely. He must have missed 5 shots inside 3 feet. Before every season we hear how much of a beast he is in the weight room. He is soft player. He peaked in his freshman season. I'm sure he is a fine person but largely disappointing on the court. Everyone keeps talking about our 3pt defense, and I agree we have issues there, but our inability to take advantage of our size down low cost us that game as much as anything.

(12-05-2016 08:54 AM)randy22263 Wrote:  

(12-05-2016 06:59 AM)CourtsideBlazer Wrote:  yet Tosin, who is so often the BIGGEST man on the floor, consistently shoots the little 2-footer (and too often MISSING) instead of dunking the ball. He rarely uses his size to his advantage.

Absolutely. He must have missed 5 shots inside 3 feet. Before every season we hear how much of a beast he is in the weight room. He is soft player. He peaked in his freshman season. I'm sure he is a fine person but largely disappointing on the court. Everyone keeps talking about our 3pt defense, and I agree we have issues there, but our inability to take advantage of our size down low cost us that game as much as anything.

I wonder if we have the people in place to coach our guys up on using our size down low effectively. Seems like anytime we do start trying to play aggressive in the post, we rack up the fouls. See Cokely fouling out with 8 minutes left in the game...and our inability to use Smallwood because he fouls too much.

Since this thread now has more posts since the game ended than it did while the game was ongoing, someone should change the title from game thread to gripe thread

(12-04-2016 10:06 PM)Dragonz Lair Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 08:25 PM)hooverblazer Wrote:  We don't need to reduce the size of Bartow. Just last season we had the following attendance in CUSA games:

6835 vs North Texas
6664 vs FIU
6211 vs FAU
7190 vs Marshall
7510 vs WKU

Those are strong crowds against teams most people in Birmingham don't care about. The only capacity reduction I'd be ok with would be removing ~500 seats by adding suites.

The problem is we still are a young university in comparison to UA, AU, and most colleges out there. It takes time to build a fan base and we just have to keep adding to it year by year with more graduates and more new students. Also, because of our relative youth and the dominance of UA and AU in this state, we have a lot of fans in the "I support UAB unless they're playing AU/UA" camp and last night was one of those instances.

We can have solid attendance like last year, but we have to win regularly (see 26 win season) and make the NCAA tournament. However, making the tournament now is much harder than it was in the days of Mike Anderson because of the weakening of our conference.

BINGO...people were coming last season to see UAB play...regardless of the opponent because we were piling up the wins...and I agree overall CUSA is way too big and watered down...but we still have quality programs that have won before...UAB, Old Dominion, Charlotte and Western Kentucky - these teams were with us in the old Sun Belt and bring familiarity...just win baby

I'm sorry, but touting old Sunbelt teams as a draw due to familiarity won't fly much anymore, particularly with young alumni. It's been how long since we were in the Sunbelt?

(12-05-2016 01:15 PM)Memphis Blazer Wrote:  Since this thread now has more posts since the game ended than it did while the game was ongoing, someone should change the title from game thread to gripe thread

I was seriously getting worried about you. Hope all is well. Was wanting your input about the actual game. You're right about the length of this thread. And I just added to it. Sorry.

(12-05-2016 06:59 AM)CourtsideBlazer Wrote:  yet Tosin, who is so often the BIGGEST man on the floor, consistently shoots the little 2-footer (and too often MISSING) instead of dunking the ball. He rarely uses his size to his advantage.

Has anyone EVER introduced Tosin to the glass (the freakin backboard)? It kills me to watch him or just about ANY of our big guys around the glass. You use the glass, it doesn't have to be a perfect shot!! Just hit the damn box outlined on the glass and 9 times out of 10 it goes in! You can throw it up there soft or hard or in between.......the glass does a LOT of the work FOR YOU!! It kills me to watch these guys going full tilt working their butts off around the boards, then try and shoot these little soft jumpers when all heck is breaking loose around them when if they would just let the board do some of the work FOR them they could easily hit the shot!!! My rant is finished..............

(12-06-2016 05:40 PM)Mungumry Blazer Wrote:  

(12-05-2016 06:59 AM)CourtsideBlazer Wrote:  yet Tosin, who is so often the BIGGEST man on the floor, consistently shoots the little 2-footer (and too often MISSING) instead of dunking the ball. He rarely uses his size to his advantage.

Has anyone EVER introduced Tosin to the glass (the freakin backboard)? It kills me to watch him or just about ANY of our big guys around the glass. You use the glass, it doesn't have to be a perfect shot!! Just hit the damn box outlined on the glass and 9 times out of 10 it goes in! You can throw it up there soft or hard or in between.......the glass does a LOT of the work FOR YOU!! It kills me to watch these guys going full tilt working their butts off around the boards, then try and shoot these little soft jumpers when all heck is breaking loose around them when if they would just let the board do some of the work FOR them they could easily hit the shot!!! My rant is finished..............

+1

+2.

I just added to the ridiculous thread.

now that AU is ranked in the Top 25 is this a "good" loss ?

Check back in March.

(12-07-2016 06:08 PM)CourtsideBlazer Wrote:   now that AU is ranked in the Top 25 is this a "good" loss ?

With the exception of the Furman game, all we have is good losses. But it gives UAB's RPI a tremendous boost!!!

(12-05-2016 02:00 PM)dfarr Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 10:06 PM)Dragonz Lair Wrote:  

(12-04-2016 08:25 PM)hooverblazer Wrote:  We don't need to reduce the size of Bartow. Just last season we had the following attendance in CUSA games:

6835 vs North Texas
6664 vs FIU
6211 vs FAU
7190 vs Marshall
7510 vs WKU

Those are strong crowds against teams most people in Birmingham don't care about. The only capacity reduction I'd be ok with would be removing ~500 seats by adding suites.

The problem is we still are a young university in comparison to UA, AU, and most colleges out there. It takes time to build a fan base and we just have to keep adding to it year by year with more graduates and more new students. Also, because of our relative youth and the dominance of UA and AU in this state, we have a lot of fans in the "I support UAB unless they're playing AU/UA" camp and last night was one of those instances.

We can have solid attendance like last year, but we have to win regularly (see 26 win season) and make the NCAA tournament. However, making the tournament now is much harder than it was in the days of Mike Anderson because of the weakening of our conference.

BINGO...people were coming last season to see UAB play...regardless of the opponent because we were piling up the wins...and I agree overall CUSA is way too big and watered down...but we still have quality programs that have won before...UAB, Old Dominion, Charlotte and Western Kentucky - these teams were with us in the old Sun Belt and bring familiarity...just win baby

I'm sorry, but touting old Sunbelt teams as a draw due to familiarity won't fly much anymore, particularly with young alumni. It's been how long since we were in the Sunbelt?

The teams named are basketball schools and have a basketball history...Charlotte and WKU have both been to Final 4's...many times in the 1980's the BJCC was packed with 16,000+ fans to watch other Sun Belt teams/etc...sure, I'd much rather be in the MWC or A-10 but here we sit in the dumpster fire known as C-USA (due to football)...just curious, how many times have you and your millennial friends packed 8,500 seat Bartow Arena?