The University of Alabama at Birmingham Athletics
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UAB to Host Louisiana on Saturday Night at Protective Stadium
9/11/2023 4:30:00 PM | Football
BIRMINGHAM – The UAB football team returns to Protective Stadium this Saturday night, Sept. 16, for a non-conference matchup with Louisiana. Kickoff is scheduled for 6 p.m. on ESPN+.
THREE THINGS TO KNOW:
Opening Statement:
"Well, obviously a very, very disappointing loss. Wasn't even close to our standard in any of the three phases. I do think if you handle losses well, they can be great learning experiences. We dealt with it that way yesterday. Nobody was upset, nobody freaked out, but we definitely used it as a learning opportunity for all of us—coach, player, everyone on the staff. I'll answer more questions about that later. Really good opponent this week in Louisiana. Really well coached. Very physical. They have great diversity in their schemes and the types of players they use—size, speed, explosion. But we're at home, and I think that's a huge thing. Playing in front of our home crowd, we've made it a point that we want to be a source of pride to our community. We want to play that way, represent them that way. And I think the biggest way we do that is playing for something bigger than ourselves, and that's why playing for Smile-A-Mile. Such a big deal for us. We're super excited about it. The boys had a glossary understanding of Smile-A-Mile, and then yesterday was really able to paint a picture of this for them. They're super jacked about that and it'll be a theme throughout the week. [It's] something that I didn't know much about, and obviously with the situation of our family losing a child and then being in the hospital setting for those forty days still is seared into my brain [and] my family's brain, and to see what Smile-A-Mile does to serve the families of those dealing with the most difficult circumstance of their life is very special to me and my family and now our football team."
On Coach Dilfer valuing serving the community:
"Well, when I was building this thing out in my head, I do believe in mission statements. I do think they're kind of the lighthouse in the distance—the thing you're aiming for—and to have 'Serve. Grow. Launch.' as one isn't just a sign on a wall. I think so often in college football, [you have] these cool sayings, really cool mottos, and then there's no action behind it. Service is the primary thing that I want to run this program on, and to get our kids, our players, [and] our coaches serving the community, serving those in need [and] serving mankind in general will only help them serve each other more and serve the program, so it started there. I mean everyone is talking about recruiting and this and that and those are all really important things. To me the urgent thing when I took this job over was the service piece. I think we've already done over 700 hours of service as a program. We're the bulk of the athletic department's service hours so far. They've taken it to heart. I know as of today we're lining up trips with Food For Our Journey, so Smile-A-Mile is just one of the many areas that we want our kids to really pour into the community."
On if Jacob Zeno's performance has exceeded Coach Dilfer's expectations:
"To start this after a loss with Jacob playing well is not representative of how I feel. Yes, he's playing well. Yes, he's been efficient. Yes, the numbers represent that. He also threw an interception in a critical moment, which is just not to our standard, and he knows that. And that's something that, as you look on film, it doesn't matter how many good things you do if you turn the ball over. I think that's the message to the offense. I really don't care about all these numbers. I'd rather be last in the nation at offense and be 2-0 and have zero turnovers. I think too often in college football, and again, this is one of my gripes with it, is [that] people get super excited about numbers, and the only number that matters is the win/loss column. And, right now, we've played losing football offensively. We turned it over three times, and he was part of that. Now, am I mad at Jacob? No, I think he's playing at a very high level. But I think for us to meet our standard as a program, that needs to be the headliner. That was losing football in all three phases. We lost the field position game, we got gashed on defense, and we turned the ball over on offense. I mean, that is lose, lose, lose. That can't happen. And then we try to mask it with all this cool stuff for social media and recruiting, and I get that. I talk to the recruits as well, like 'Hey, that's not who we are.' But at the end of the day, that's losing football. And we have to establish a culture around here, and Bill did it. It is something that I feel like I've failed the program at, that there was a culture of 'play clean on offense, stop people on defense, and win the kicking game,' that we did zero of the three against Georgia Southern and that has to be fixed. So, I'm sorry for being Debbie Downer, but that's just the reality of it. Somebody came in and said, 'second in completion percentage,' and this, this, and that. All I see is three turnovers. That's all I see. All I see is getting gashed on kickoff return. All I see is giving up more points than I think we gave up as a team all of last year when I was a coach."
On improvement in the running game:
"We have to be more physical with the line of scrimmage. Better knock back. We lost the knock back game again. That's two weeks in a row we lost the knock back game, and that just can't happen. And again, people are going say, 'Well, young offensive line, inexperienced offensive line.' You have a job to do—knock 'em back. We've got to do a better job at that. Now, I'll give them a lot of credit, they did a really nice job presenting a profile of being ultra-aggressive to take away the running game. It was definitely in their mind that they were not going to let Skull or Jacob get going. I think they saw the tape of week one, they saw the dynamic qualities those two have, our ability to run the ball well at times in the first game, and that was direct intent to take that away. It's one of the reasons why we were able to throw the ball for so many yards, was because they were committed to taking away the run."
THREE THINGS TO KNOW:
- UAB looks to bounce back after a road loss last week at Georgia Southern and returns to Protective Stadium where the Blazers are 9-3 at home since the stadium opened in 2021. Louisiana is also coming off a road loss suffered at Old Dominion and both teams enter the contest with identical 1-1 records.
- UAB's offense is averaging 467.5 yards per game, paced by quarterback Jacob Zeno who leads the nation with 35.5 completions per game. Zeno also ranks second nationally in completion percentage (84.5%, 71-of-84) and fourth in passing yards per game (338.0). His high level of accuracy has ascended UAB to No. 1 nationally in 3rd down conversion percentage (69.6%, 16-of-23) through the first two weeks of the season.
- As part of a season-long initiative to serve as many people and organizations in the city of Birmingham as possible, the Blazers will honor Smile-A-Mile by wearing alternate black and lime uniforms with the names of 100 patients on the back of their jerseys. Smile-A-Mile's mission is to provide hope, healing of the spirit and love for the whole family during the childhood cancer journey. Located just three blocks away from UAB's campus, Smile-A-Mile has served families dealing with childhood cancer for 40 years and UAB student-athletes have done numerous volunteer hours with the organization. Most recently, UAB football volunteered at Smile-A-Mile's 5K run on August 26.
- Additionally, this will be the first time UAB has worn black uniforms since 2006.
Opening Statement:
"Well, obviously a very, very disappointing loss. Wasn't even close to our standard in any of the three phases. I do think if you handle losses well, they can be great learning experiences. We dealt with it that way yesterday. Nobody was upset, nobody freaked out, but we definitely used it as a learning opportunity for all of us—coach, player, everyone on the staff. I'll answer more questions about that later. Really good opponent this week in Louisiana. Really well coached. Very physical. They have great diversity in their schemes and the types of players they use—size, speed, explosion. But we're at home, and I think that's a huge thing. Playing in front of our home crowd, we've made it a point that we want to be a source of pride to our community. We want to play that way, represent them that way. And I think the biggest way we do that is playing for something bigger than ourselves, and that's why playing for Smile-A-Mile. Such a big deal for us. We're super excited about it. The boys had a glossary understanding of Smile-A-Mile, and then yesterday was really able to paint a picture of this for them. They're super jacked about that and it'll be a theme throughout the week. [It's] something that I didn't know much about, and obviously with the situation of our family losing a child and then being in the hospital setting for those forty days still is seared into my brain [and] my family's brain, and to see what Smile-A-Mile does to serve the families of those dealing with the most difficult circumstance of their life is very special to me and my family and now our football team."
On Coach Dilfer valuing serving the community:
"Well, when I was building this thing out in my head, I do believe in mission statements. I do think they're kind of the lighthouse in the distance—the thing you're aiming for—and to have 'Serve. Grow. Launch.' as one isn't just a sign on a wall. I think so often in college football, [you have] these cool sayings, really cool mottos, and then there's no action behind it. Service is the primary thing that I want to run this program on, and to get our kids, our players, [and] our coaches serving the community, serving those in need [and] serving mankind in general will only help them serve each other more and serve the program, so it started there. I mean everyone is talking about recruiting and this and that and those are all really important things. To me the urgent thing when I took this job over was the service piece. I think we've already done over 700 hours of service as a program. We're the bulk of the athletic department's service hours so far. They've taken it to heart. I know as of today we're lining up trips with Food For Our Journey, so Smile-A-Mile is just one of the many areas that we want our kids to really pour into the community."
On if Jacob Zeno's performance has exceeded Coach Dilfer's expectations:
"To start this after a loss with Jacob playing well is not representative of how I feel. Yes, he's playing well. Yes, he's been efficient. Yes, the numbers represent that. He also threw an interception in a critical moment, which is just not to our standard, and he knows that. And that's something that, as you look on film, it doesn't matter how many good things you do if you turn the ball over. I think that's the message to the offense. I really don't care about all these numbers. I'd rather be last in the nation at offense and be 2-0 and have zero turnovers. I think too often in college football, and again, this is one of my gripes with it, is [that] people get super excited about numbers, and the only number that matters is the win/loss column. And, right now, we've played losing football offensively. We turned it over three times, and he was part of that. Now, am I mad at Jacob? No, I think he's playing at a very high level. But I think for us to meet our standard as a program, that needs to be the headliner. That was losing football in all three phases. We lost the field position game, we got gashed on defense, and we turned the ball over on offense. I mean, that is lose, lose, lose. That can't happen. And then we try to mask it with all this cool stuff for social media and recruiting, and I get that. I talk to the recruits as well, like 'Hey, that's not who we are.' But at the end of the day, that's losing football. And we have to establish a culture around here, and Bill did it. It is something that I feel like I've failed the program at, that there was a culture of 'play clean on offense, stop people on defense, and win the kicking game,' that we did zero of the three against Georgia Southern and that has to be fixed. So, I'm sorry for being Debbie Downer, but that's just the reality of it. Somebody came in and said, 'second in completion percentage,' and this, this, and that. All I see is three turnovers. That's all I see. All I see is getting gashed on kickoff return. All I see is giving up more points than I think we gave up as a team all of last year when I was a coach."
On improvement in the running game:
"We have to be more physical with the line of scrimmage. Better knock back. We lost the knock back game again. That's two weeks in a row we lost the knock back game, and that just can't happen. And again, people are going say, 'Well, young offensive line, inexperienced offensive line.' You have a job to do—knock 'em back. We've got to do a better job at that. Now, I'll give them a lot of credit, they did a really nice job presenting a profile of being ultra-aggressive to take away the running game. It was definitely in their mind that they were not going to let Skull or Jacob get going. I think they saw the tape of week one, they saw the dynamic qualities those two have, our ability to run the ball well at times in the first game, and that was direct intent to take that away. It's one of the reasons why we were able to throw the ball for so many yards, was because they were committed to taking away the run."
Players Mentioned
QB
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