Blazers Trek To California To Face Strong Santa Clara Squad In NIT

By Steve Irvine

BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA - March 23, 2025

Andy Kennedy wasn’t sure about his UAB basketball team’s postseason fate in the moments following the American Athletic Conference Tournament championship game loss to Memphis. He didn’t know for sure that the Blazes were NIT bound until he stepped off the airplane in Birmingham several hours later.

“I didn’t even know if we were in play to be in the NIT,” Kennedy said. “We land in Birmingham and we see they announced we were in. I hadn’t even talked to my team (about going to the NIT). Yax (Lendeborg) was obviously really banged up with a toe and his back. Ja’Borri (McGhee) takes a hard spill against Memphis. I didn’t even know if we had enough healthy bodies to play and here we are telling us we’re in. The whole thing was bizarre.”

It wasn’t until they got to the UAB campus that they learned the opening assignment would be a trip to Philadelphia and that could possibly be followed by a game in Northern California with the possibility of playing another game in Southern California. By now, you know that UAB walked away from the first road assignment with a gritty 69-65 win at Saint Joseph’s. On Sunday night, the Blazers (23-12) will play Santa Clara (22-11) in a second round game that will tip off at 8 p.m. at the Leavey Center. The game will be shown on ESPN U.

If the Blazers pull off the upset win on Sunday night, it’s possible they will stay in California for another game. No. 1 seed UC Irvine plays host to Jacksonville State at the same time on Sunday night. If UC Irvine wins, the Anteaters will host the quarterfinal game on either Tuesday or Wednesday. If UAB is the opponent then the Blazers will bus from Santa Clara to Irvine, which is approximately a 388-mile trip, for the quarterfinal game. If Jacksonville State and UAB both win then the Gamecocks will host the quarterfinal game.

About all Kennedy can do is laugh about what was already been a whirlwind journey.

“I know they want to try to do brackets and do it as reasonable as possible to make sure that the teams that they feel have earned the right to be higher seed (are rewarded),” said Kennedy, whose team bused to Atlanta and flew to San Jose on Friday. “But some of it just doesn't make any sense. I mean, there are four teams in the state of Alabama that were all in the NIT. They sent us all, you know, all over the country. Jacksonville State is out here with us. If Jacksonville State wins, and we win, then we're going to trek all the way back across country to play in Jacksonville, Alabama. It's just kind of crazy, because the NCAA owns this. Obviously, their focus is on the NCAA tournament and so maybe there needs to be a different operating body as it relates to just simply zoning in on the logistics of it all.”

That is another problem for another time. For now, Kennedy is focused of Sunday’s assignment against a Santa Clara team that improved to 21-12 by beating UC Riverside, 101-62, in a NIT first round game on Tuesday. The Broncos have four wins over NCAA Tournament teams. They beat McNeese State (74-67), have a pair of wins over UC San Diego (81-80 on the road, 93-70 at home) and knocked off Gonzaga, 103-99, in Spokane, Washington.

It doesn’t take long to figure out what the Broncos do best, at least offensively. Santa Clara is one of the best 3-point shooting teams in the country, ranking fifth nationally in 3-pointers per game.

“We haven't made 11 3s in a game all year, right, and they average 11 a game,” said Kennedy whose team had 10 3-pointers four times this season.

Santa Clara is 363-for-948 on 3-pointers this season, which is an average of 11-for-29 per game. In the last 10 games, the only time Santa Clara didn’t reach double digits in 3-pointers was when the Broncos were 9-for-24 in a loss at Saint Mary’s. The Broncos hit a season-high 23 in 38 attempts, an average of 60.5 percent, in a road win at Washington State. The 23 made 3-pointers missed tying the national season high by one. What makes them particularly dangerous is the 3-pointers come from nearly every player on the floor. Six Santa Clara players have at least 30 3-pointers with 6-foot-7 senior Adama-Alpha Bal (69 3-pointers), 6-foot-1 senior Carlos Stewart (65 3-pointers), 6-foot-5 senior Tyeree Bryan (64 3-pointers) and 6-foot-10 senior Johnny O’Neil (55 3-pointers) leading the way.

What will the UAB defense to counter the outside shooting ability?

“Really stay attached,” Kennedy said. “They run a lot of ball screen motion movement and the way we're going to defend it, we just got to stay attached. You know, everybody's got to make sure that when their guy has the ball, they really extend you because of all levels can make shots.”

UAB also has to play its own game and not attempt to get in a 3-point shooting contest. UAB has taken 1,621 2-point attempts this season while attempting 675 3-pointers. Tyren Moore is the UAB leader with 53 3-pointers, which would be fifth for Santa Clara. The Broncos attempted 1,083 2-pointers and 948 3-pointers in 33 games.

“We're a team, just based on the way we're designed, we score a lot of our points from the two-point range and from the free throw line,” Kennedy said. “We're not a volume 3-point shooting team. We've got to make timely ones just based on who we are. They're the polar opposite. They're one of the lowest in the country in the percentage of their points they get from two-point range. They don't get to the free throw line a whole lot, but I think they're 10th in the country as it relates to percentage of points coming from three.”

Defending the 3-point shot will be a key for UAB if the Blazers can continue play in the NIT. Obviously, the NCAA Tournament was the goal but staying alive in the NIT is important.

“As you get deeper into the tournament, you start to realize, again, there's only so many teams still playing,” said Kennedy, whose team made the NIT championship game in 2023. “I remember Trey Jemison, obviously, who is in the NBA now. He had not even been invited to a postseason all-star game setting for college seniors until after we beat Vanderbilt in the quarterfinals of the NIT. I think his performance in that game, the fact that it was a standalone game, the fact that there was only so many college teams playing, I think he used the platform in order to get right into the (Portsmouth Invitational Tournament). Playing deep into the season, allowing him the platform to get the exposure, ultimately led him to the NBA. Every time that UAB is on television, that's good for the UAB brand.”