UAB at Louisiana
UAB (1‑1) travels to Louisiana (1‑1), with Louisiana favored by 7.5. The model gives Louisiana a 72% shot.
How they got here
Last two games
UAB · 1-1
Picked #55 in the preseason · now #58.
1-1 in its last two — but nothing on this résumé beats a top-40 team yet.
What’s at stake
UAB
- UAB is the AAC program whose 2014 football program shutdown + 2017 resurrection + Bill Clark 2018 Conference USA championship + Protective Stadium 2021 define what dropped-and-revived-football-program looks like.
Louisiana
- Louisiana sits at 2% to make the CFP field — 3% with a win here, 1% with a loss.
- Louisiana is still shaking off a 19-point loss.
The series
The series is tied 4-4
8 meetings since 1995 · Louisiana has won the last 3
- 2023Louisiana 41–21
- 2020Louisiana 24–20
- 2002Louisiana 34–0
- 2000UAB 47–2
- 1998UAB 24–13
Face-off
What each fanbase carries into this one.
UAB
The chip · vs big brotherUAB fans never forget that their own university system — the one that answers to Tuscaloosa — tried to bury the program. Every season the Blazers exist at all, they say, is a win over the people who wanted them gone.
Louisiana
The chip · vs the national mediaFans point to four straight conference titles and a top-20 ranking and ask why the national conversation still files them under generic Sun Belt mid-pack — as if the best run any Sun Belt program ever stacked never happened.
What this game touches
The post-Napier slide. Billy Napier won four straight Sun Belt titles (2018-2021) and a #19 finish, then left for Florida. Michael Desormeaux, his hand-picked successor, slipped to 6-7 in 2025 — a losing record capped by a 20-13 loss to Delaware in the 68 Ventures Bowl — and Lafayette is asking whether the standard was ever the program's or only the coach's.
Best players
UAB
- Muaaz Byard (LB) · 20 tackles
- Eli Ennis (LB) · 16 tackles
- Ike Esonwune (LB) · 15 tackles
Louisiana
- Collin Jacob (S) · 17 tackles
- Jake St. Andre (LB) · 12 tackles
- Conor McPherson (LB) · 12 tackles
The line, and the room
Louisiana fans are feeling it more than most fanbases this week (82nd percentile) — the mood matches the numbers.
Home −7.5 · O/U 56.5
Conditions
82°F · 6 mph wind
Louisiana is worth +4.4 points (±3.7) more at home than on the road since 2018 — middle of FBS, 58th percentile.
71% at home, 60% on the road against FBS opponents (29–12 home, 30–20 away).
Our model gives every stadium the same flat 2.3-point home edge (why); the books use about 3. Against the closing line this stadium reads -0.4 at home vs. away over 75 games — inside the ±6.2 noise, so the flat number is the honest one here.
Night kickoff — historically worth about half a point more to the home side against the number, and not much more than that. The visitors travel about 383 miles to get here.
Recent games
Louisiana
- Wk 1Wvs Lamar38-7
- Wk 2Lat USC30-49
UAB
- Wk 1Lat Illinois23-42
- Wk 2Wvs UL Monroe26-20
Trajectory
The market
Book hold: 4.1%