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

I hope everybody had a great Thanksgiving! I know I did. I went to one of the casino buffets, ate my weight in roasted lamb, brisket, prime rib, and hot link sausage while enjoying some nice people watching.

What a dreadful weekend for Blazer sports last weekend. I watched my first UAB basketball game, the FSU one. I know they had some big ol' boys but it seems like we didn't have any offensive sets to speak of. Just driving it in and throwing it up. I was talking with a buddy the other day and said I feel like UAB hasn't had offensive sets since I have become a fan (2009). It seems our formula has always been

1) Stellar athlete that can get to the basket
2) Average 3 point shooter to take pressure off of stellar athlete
3) Big body down low to rebound the 3's fogged up by the average 3 point shooter

and it seems like we have 1 and 3 this year, but not 2. That makes it pretty tough. Follow that up with the MTSU football game and I was pretty sour. The Titans stinking it up on Monday night didn't help me out at all.

Anyways, to get to more positive stuff, I am pumped about the contract for Coach Clark! I hope we are putting in a relatively huge buyout in there so that if someone does come in there and poach him away from us they have to write us a check to pay off the football operations building. This should help us keep our DC as well, I know people were talking about him being a possible target for HC jobs at smaller programs.

I got a notification on Youtube about the UAB cross country coach giving a preview of the upcoming season. I almost watched it to see what kind of commentary he would offer:

"Now Jennifer is really good at running moderately fast for long distances. Samantha, though, wow, she is an electrifying athlete. The longest stride I have seen in my 18 years of coaching."

Not belittling cross country as a sport, as I know it is just as challenging as other sports to prepare for, but the idea of a season preview of a non "team" sport just sounds funny.

GO BLAZERS lets win this championship this weekend!

Everyone may have to just be patient with men's basketball.

We certainly aren't going to exceed what we did under Haase without bumping up a conference level.

Interesting to see how the women haven't hit the top 25 yet. Would have thought the Tennessee performance did that for them.

President George H.W. Bush (#41) died today.

Knew it wouldn’t be long after Barbara died.

(12-01-2018 12:49 AM)Memphis Blazer Wrote:  Knew it wouldn’t be long after Barbara died.

^^^^

(11-30-2018 02:31 PM)the_blazerman Wrote:  Everyone may have to just be patient with men's basketball.

We certainly aren't going to exceed what we did under Haase without bumping up a conference level.

Bumping up a conference level IMHO would be great for football but would be currently a disaster for basketball. We are competitive in CUSA top third and our facilities and budget are equal to other basketball teams. But we would be bottom two or three in say AAC. ). Our limited resources with the current mentality (of fans) would be spent trying to up the level of football and basketball would continue to starve. The average AAC overall budget of AAC conference team is fifty million.

So what can we do to get ready. We need to bring our basketball facilities out of the sixties. The next big step is underway(per AB) is fundraising for a basketball practice facility. We need to fund raise/get commitments to attract a million a year coach when we replace our currently failing assistant

(12-01-2018 10:44 AM)uabbean Wrote:  

(11-30-2018 02:31 PM)the_blazerman Wrote:  Everyone may have to just be patient with men's basketball.

We certainly aren't going to exceed what we did under Haase without bumping up a conference level.

Bumping up a conference level IMHO would be great for football but would be currently a disaster for basketball. We are competitive in CUSA top third and our facilities and budget are equal to other basketball teams. But we would be bottom two or three in say AAC. ). Our limited resources with the current mentality (of fans) would be spent trying to up the level of football and basketball would continue to starve. The average AAC overall budget of AAC conference team is fifty million.

So what can we do to get ready. We need to bring our basketball facilities out of the sixties. The next big step is underway(per AB) is fundraising for a basketball practice facility. We need to fund raise/get commitments to attract a million a year coach when we replace our currently failing assistant

1) people have said it would be a disaster when we went to the Great Midwest and when we went to CUSA
2) the facilities are not from the 60s since they didn’t exist in the 60's
3) if we join the AAC, it won’t be the AAC of today. It will be a weakened version because for us to join, teams would have to have left. Memphis thought they were joining the Big East. They basically got CUSA And we got CUSA lite.

I do agree that UAB needs to stop starving basketball and fan interest needs to return.

Fan interest increases as a result of a good program. NOT the other way around. How many f'ing times must you be told that. We are 40 years into this. People aren't showing up to see a mid level CUSA team play sub 200 teams. Go out, raise money for facilities but also recognize we need a coach capable of bringing this program back. Nothing changes until we are serious about basketball. Expecting Ehsan to "learn" to become a great coach is like expecting you to not be such an excuse making *******.

i really like a good plate of biscuits and gravy

for people that would throw a hissy fit if we went back to the Bahamas or Hawaii bowl, at least we know for sure thats not going to happen.

(12-01-2018 12:41 PM)randy22263 Wrote:  Fan interest increases as a result of a good program. NOT the other way around. How many f'ing times must you be told that. We are 40 years into this. People aren't showing up to see a mid level CUSA team play sub 200 teams. Go out, raise money for facilities but also recognize we need a coach capable of bringing this program back. Nothing changes until we are serious about basketball. Expecting Ehsan to "learn" to become a great coach is like expecting you to not be such an excuse making *******.

**** u

When is your new stadium supposed to be ready?

(12-01-2018 05:35 PM)SMUfan Wrote:  When is your new stadium supposed to be ready?

I heard the stadium will be open in maybe 2020 or 2021.

2018 Birmingham Bowl will have Memphis against Wake Forest on December 22.

(12-03-2018 02:39 AM)C-Finder Wrote:  2018 Birmingham Bowl will have Memphis against Wake Forest on December 22.

I'm pretty excited about this game. Memphis came on strong later in the season and Wake is a pretty decent team.

Which conferences were affiliated with the Bham Bowl?

I thought it was AAC vs SEC.

My interest in it has gone away since no CUSA tie in anymore.

(12-03-2018 11:12 AM)Auburn_Blazer Wrote:  

(12-03-2018 02:39 AM)C-Finder Wrote:  2018 Birmingham Bowl will have Memphis against Wake Forest on December 22.

I'm pretty excited about this game. Memphis came on strong later in the season and Wake is a pretty decent team.

There is little to no interest from Memphis fans on their board to going back to Legion Field

(12-03-2018 12:23 PM)Memphis Blazer Wrote:  

(12-03-2018 11:12 AM)Auburn_Blazer Wrote:  

(12-03-2018 02:39 AM)C-Finder Wrote:  2018 Birmingham Bowl will have Memphis against Wake Forest on December 22.

I'm pretty excited about this game. Memphis came on strong later in the season and Wake is a pretty decent team.

There is little to no interest from Memphis fans on their board to going back to Legion Field

I'm shocked. Absolutely shocked. Especially considering how badly they blew it the last time they came here.

If there was a new stadium here they might be a tad more interested.

Then again, playing here for the 20th time in the last 15 years probably gets old.

(12-03-2018 01:29 PM)Auburn_Blazer Wrote:  

(12-03-2018 12:23 PM)Memphis Blazer Wrote:  

(12-03-2018 11:12 AM)Auburn_Blazer Wrote:  

(12-03-2018 02:39 AM)C-Finder Wrote:  2018 Birmingham Bowl will have Memphis against Wake Forest on December 22.

I'm pretty excited about this game. Memphis came on strong later in the season and Wake is a pretty decent team.

There is little to no interest from Memphis fans on their board to going back to Legion Field

I'm shocked. Absolutely shocked. Especially considering how badly they blew it the last time they came here.

Reportedly that was because they were about to lose their coach.... which could happen again this year tpp