UAB Falls to USF, 82-69, on Thursday Night
By Steve Irvine
BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA - January 23, 2026
It didn’t take much digging to figure out the problem in UAB’s 82-69 American Conference loss to South Florida on Thursday night at Bartow Arena.
“We shoot 29 percent (from the field),” UAB head coach Andy Kennedy said after seeing his team’s Bartow Arena losing streak grow to four games. “So the last game we gave up over 60 percent from the field. Tonight, I thought we were able to be scrappy enough to turn them over a few times. They ended up with 16 turnovers. We had our opportunity to get back in the game. We got nine consecutive stops, turnovers or missed shots. Nine consecutive. We scored four points (during that stretch). That was our chance. And you got to seize those moments, and we didn't.”
What made it even more frustrating, at least from a UAB perspective, was the Blazers got some good looks, even though they struggled with USF’s inside length. But those good looks still only resulted in 22 field goals in 75 attempts, including 4-for-25 from outside the 3-point arc.
“Clean looks, mean the ones that I want for the same guy shooting,” Kennedy said of one of the most important offensive stats. “This team is shooting less than 35 percent. (In) 19 years of me doing this, I've never had a team shoot less than 48 percent and that was the worst team that I've ever coached. This team is shooting less than 35 percent on the shots that we are working to get.”
At one point in the postgame press conference, Kennedy looked at the stat sheet and started reading off individual shooting stats. None of them were pretty, other than perhaps Daniel Rivera, who was 3-for-4 from the floor and 8-for-11 from the free throw line.
Kennedy was asked how they crawl out of the shooting hole.
“It's got to be energy and it's got to be second-chance points,” Kennedy said. “And we've got to try to turn them over and try to get in the open floor.”
UAB (12-7 overall, 3-3 American Conference) actually did that in the second half on Thursday but couldn’t convert, allowing USF to avenge a 109-106 double overtime loss to UAB in Tampa earlier his season. The first 16 minutes of the second meeting was competitive but, for the second game in a row, UAB struggled to close out the first half. USF (12-7 overall, 4-2 American Conference) went on a 12-2 run over the final 4:45 of the half to take a 45-34 advantage into halftime.
Unlike last Sunday’s loss to Tulsa, when the Blazers never really recovered in the second half, but they did continue to battle.
In the first half of Thursday, UAB was outrebounded, 25-19, overall and 10-6 on offensive rebounds. USF won second chance points, 12-5, in the first half. In the second half, UAB outrebounded USF, 27-21, and won the offensive rebound battle 10-6. The Blazers also won the second chance points, 14-6, in the second half. Overall, Evan Chatman had 11 rebounds for the Blazers.
Despite that, though, USF was able to stretch the lead to as many as 18 points in the second half, partly because USF’s Joseph Pinion had half of his six 3-pointers after halftime. But UAB kept chipping away and had the lead down to 10 points after a three-point play by Chance Westry with 3:43 remaining. UAB followed with back-to-back defensive stops but couldn’t hit shots to climb closer.
“I thought we battled, man,” Kennedy said. “I thought we battled to the bitter end. But then when the ball just doesn't go in the basket, it really illuminates your lack of the ability to make plays. And I thought that was certainly the case.”
When it was over, UAB had its first sub-30 percent shooting night since losing to McNeese State on Nov. 28, 2023. The Blazers don’t return to the court again until back-to-back road games against UTSA on next Wednesday and North Texas the following Saturday.