Nov. 8, 2008

C-USA Championship Notes | Gametracker
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. ----- The UAB men's soccer team may be experiencing déjà vu. For a second consecutive season, the Blazers are the No. 8 seed in the upcoming 2008 Conference USA Championship, and for a second straight year, they will square off against No. 1 seed Tulsa in the opening round on Wednesday, Nov. 12 at 5:30 p.m. CT.

Last season, the Blazers fell to top-seed Tulsa, 1-0, in the opening round of the 2007 C-USA Championship, hosted by UAB.

"Tulsa is a terrific team and will be a great challenge for us," UAB head coach Mike Getman said. "However, I feel our team is up to the challenge. We have played well over the last several weeks and I think we are riding some momentum coming into the championship."

The Blazers secured a spot in the C-USA Championship with a 3-0 defeat over Marshall on Friday night. The victory improved the Blazers to 2-1-1 over their last four contests.

The UAB win, coupled by a FIU loss (2-1) to SMU sealed the Blazers' 14th consecutive appearance in the conference championship.

"We played quite well against a very good Marshall team," Getman said following the victory. "I thought we competed hard in what turned out to be the biggest game of the year. But a sign of a good team is to get the job done when it's on the line and that's exactly what we did tonight."

Earlier this year, it took overtime for the No. 7-ranked Golden Hurricane to slip past the Blazers, 2-1, back on Oct. 4. In that contest, UAB led 1-0 for a short while before Tulsa tied the game just prior to halftime. Tulsa's Austin Neil scored the game-winning goal just 1:09 into the overtime period to lift the Golden Hurricane to victory.

The UAB-Tulsa game can be followed live on Gametracker by logging on to the Conference USA official website, ConferenceUSA.com.