(10-15-2018 01:59 PM)the Dragon Wrote: (10-15-2018 01:43 PM)BAMANBLAZERFAN Wrote: We have come a long way in an amazingly short time.
I don't mean this as a disagreement because I know what you mean, but for most of us, this has been painfully long in the making.
There have been so many times where we have had the rug pulled out from under us as UAB fans.
Black Friday when Bryant Jr. first tried to kill the program the weekend where we had our first 1st round draft pick.
The early heartbreakers against Southern Miss, The overtime game and the 0-3 game in particular.
The Tulane game where we entered the weekend with the same record we have now and ranked in the top 25 of the first ever BCS poll.
Hackney's senior season where it became obvious early the the team was but an empty shell behind a talented senior class because of the recruiting hit we took after Black Friday.
Years after the program needed to part ways with Watson, finally having hope that we could breathe fresh life into the program with a new coach, only to have Bryant Jr. again sabotage our program by forcing Calloway down our throats.
The false hope of Garrick McGee. Does anyone remember how excited we all were before his first season, and the agony of worrying that Petrino's motorcycle accident was going to end up costing us "our coach" before he coached a single game?
Speaking for myself, by the time we hired Coach Clark I had pretty much ceased to have expectations. I was like "Well, he has a winning background and he cant be worse than the last three coaches we had." Only to realize that he was the real deal about the same time we realized that Bryant Jr. was finally going to try finish the job he started with Black Friday and kill UAB football.
The Fall of 14 where the team opened a can on Troy then after some growing pains seemed to keep improving week after week even as the rumors of an impending shutdown grew. The growing realization that the fix was in, that our own President was in on it from the beginning. That terrible day when that ratf*cker Ray Watts made the announcement.
I've been a UAB fan since Bill Clinton was President and I'm more excited now about the state of the program than I have ever been. I'm more fired up about Saturdays game then any I can remember.
All of that said, the significance of Saturday's game to me is simply this: For the first time ever we are playing a football game that has legitimate conference championship implications. Win or lose, I have no doubt that it will not be the last.