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It'll be two of these schools: Houston, Cinci, or BYU (outside shot of Memphis).

BYU's biggest hangup is not playing on Sundays.

(02-03-2016 02:55 PM)CourtsideBlazer Wrote:  While Rice is in Houston, they get practically ZERO media coverage. (its worse than what UAB gets in Bham) SoMiss has the same middle-of-nowhere market probs that Marshall has. WKU & MTSU are legit.

We get better exposure than many C-USA schools, that's for certain. The number of eyeballs that see UAB-related news is actually pretty strong. Could it be better? Yeah. But it could be a heck of a lot worse.

If TV market, media attention and eyeballs on its news were the only determining factors, UAB would have had new facilities, its own choice of FB coaches and probably a p6 conference berth ten to twenty years ago. Those have never been the principal determinants of UAB's athletic fortunes. As they say in tournament competition - "Survive and advance" - which is what UAB FB is in the process of doing right now.

Gene Bartow got UAB into C-USA as a stepping stone to a higher conference. UAB's real barriers almost cost us even that ranking last year. It is hoped that the remaining members of the BOT and whoever the future new members may be will comprehend how the willful behavior of a few Old Guard almost cost this state something special.

One item cited in the article does have importance to UAB. The author mentioned that $9 million annually was, at that level, essentially pocket change and not to be considered serious financial backing for a major program. UAB must show that it can raise the level of investment EVERY SEASON like the big guys in P5 programs do, not just when the program has been attacked.

(02-03-2016 03:24 PM)blazers9911 Wrote:  

(02-03-2016 03:00 PM)hooverblazer Wrote:  

(02-03-2016 02:58 PM)Blazer85 Wrote:  

(02-03-2016 02:51 PM)blazers9911 Wrote:  

(02-03-2016 02:28 PM)hooverblazer Wrote:  Way behind? Who would you classify as way in front of us that's not in a middle of nowhere market? IMO, there's not a single school that's the obvious favorite to be an AAC call up. That means we have the opportunity to separate ourselves if we get the discussed facilities built, continue our current bball momentum, and start strong with football in 2017-2018.

ODU is miles ahead of us in my opinion. I would also assume they would currently take rice, southern miss, and Marshall before us without even thinking about it. La tech, wku, and mtsu are also part of the equation. Just my opinion, but we are either neck and neck or behind all these schools as far as I'm concerned.

Before the commitment to football, I might have agreed with you. At this point, UAB will be at or near the top of the list when it comes to CUSA programs looking to move up to the AAC given our new stadium, new support facilities, our success in basketball, big TV market, growing city that is generating a lot of buzz in regional and national publications, etc. Add to that our history and relationships with many of the programs currently in the AAC, and I think we have a leg up on most of the others.

I agree with this.

I agree with this if it all comes to fruition in the future. The problem is this isn't where we currently stand. I am well aware of how well we are recruiting, but how many of these guys will actually see the field? How many will pan out on the field? How long will it take to actually get things built? There are still a lot of questions, and we only have one year of Clark as a head coach to go off of. I trust in everything we are doing now, but to an outsider you can see why people would have a lot of questions still.

Why are you trying to bring levetivity to this discussion?