Quick Turnaround For UAB AS Blazers Host Charlotte In AAC MatcHUP
By Steve Irvine
BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA - February 1, 2025
A busy stretch for the UAB men’s basketball team continues on Saturday afternoon when Charlotte visits Bartow Arena for an American Athletic Conference game.
For the Blazers, it’s the second of three games over six days. UAB opened that stretch with a road win at Tulsa and concludes it on Monday night with a critical AAC game against co-leader North Texas. UAB then has an eight-day break before playing at East Carolina on Feb. 11.
UAB head coach Andy Kennedy approaches the quirky scheduling stretch with a shrug.
“TV runs the world and sports, you know that,” said Kennedy, whose team will play in a 1 p.m. game on Saturday. “I mean, that's been evident with everything that's been transpiring in our world. But you just play the games as they're called to be played.”
And it truly takes a one-game-at-a-time approach, particularly for a team in the chase for a regular season conference title.
“We just got to take it one step at a time,” said Kennedy, whose team trails the two AAC teams that have beaten them by a game. “We don't talk North Texas. Let's just talk about being best version of self on Saturday. And then whatever happens, we’ve got to quickly regroup and get ready for another game in less than 36 hours.”
It’s certainly not the first time that Kennedy or anyone else in the UAB program has experienced quick turnarounds. Obviously, it happens during regular season and postseason tournaments. One of Kennedy’s most unique experiences as a player came during his senior season at UAB. The Blazers beat Auburn on the Friday night before the Iron Bowl and lost to reigning national champion UNLV on the following night in Vancouver, British Columbia. That’s two games in two days in arenas that were approximately 2,650 miles apart.
“It was a promotional deal where we played where the Vancouver CFL team played,” Kennedy said. “We played in the football stadium. (UNLV) had been there for like three days. We fly in, take a little nap, go to the game and play. Obviously, that game did not turn out well for the Blazers but we did it. I asked Coach Bartow, you don’t ask him as a player, but i asked him years later why would we do that. He said there was like a $75,000 guarantee, which in those days was big money. Then, the promoter didn't pay us. But he owned a car dealership, so he ended up giving (the UAB athletic department) a car.”
The current stretch is not as complicated as that two-game swing. Assistant coach Chris Shumate was in charge of the Charlotte scouting report. Kennedy said he got the scouting report on the bus to the airport following the win over Tulsa. They worked on the film from Tulsa on the charter flight home, arrived back in Birmingham around 12:30 a.m., got a few hours sleep and began preparing for Charlotte on Thursday. The North Texas preparation, with only one day in between games, will be more difficult but UAB does have the advantage of not traveling on Sunday. North Texas plays a home game against UTSA on Saturday at 5 p.m. and then must travel on Sunday.
For now, though, the focus for UAB is solely on Charlotte, which is 8-13 overall and 1-7 in The American. The 49ers are coming off perhaps their best two conference games. They beat South Florida, 69-61, on Jan. 22 and dropped a 90-89 decision in double overtime at Temple on Wednesday.
The 49ers are led by 6-foot-3 guard Nik Graves, who started all 30 games last season and each of the team’s 21 games this season. He averages16.9 points, 4.2 rebounds and 3.1 assists per game. Giancarlo Rosado, a 6-foot-8, 240-pound FAU transfer, averages 11.8 points and 6.5 rebounds per game. Robert Baswell, who is in his seventh season of college basketball, is a 6-foot-7 forward, who averages 11.6 points per game.
“When I watch them, they're 1-7 in the league, and I think they're better than that,” Kennedy said. “I think they're just – it's just a bounce here, a bounce there. They could have easily won at Temple, where Temple is undefeated at home. (Temple) beat Memphis at home. They're a good team, and Charlotte could have easily won that game. So all teams are capable. During all these games, you know, it's a shot here it's a shot there. We've got to we've got to make sure that we're focused on the task at hand of our mission and our mission is trying to compete for a conference championship. You can’t do that don't win your home games.”
UAB enters this stretch, which includes three home games in the next four contests, with a 13-8 overall record and 6-2 mark in conference play. Win these next two games and UAB will be, at worst, in a second-place tie in the AAC standings.
“When you play at Bartow and the energy is right, it does create a homecourt advantage for you,” Kennedy said. “You know, everybody talks about what's the best league in the country, what's the hardest league in the country. Well, the hardest league just happens to be the league you're in. As a coach, that's how you think about it. For us, protecting homecourt is so, so valuable. A big part of that is our fans, the energy that they bring and the understanding of the importance of protecting home court, if indeed you want to seriously challenge for a conference championship.”