Name-a-Day Calendar, September 8: UAB Blazers

Page 306 of 365

Chosen in: 1978

Chosen by: Student Tommy Burns via student body vote

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The school we know today as the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) has its roots as a medical school founded all the way back in 1859. It has a long, rich history, but I’m going to ignore most of it because they somehow didn’t begin intercollegiate athletics until 1970. Their first intercollegiate team, a men’s golf squad, bore no official nickname.

That men’s golf team generated relatively little buzz around campus. The same could not be said of their second intercollegiate athletics program. On June 14, 1977, university president Dr. S. Richardson Hill Jr. shocked everyone by announcing that not only would UAB be starting a men’s basketball program, but also that he’d successfully recruited Gene Bartow—the sitting head coach of national powerhouse UCLA—away from Westwood to build this program from scratch. Bartow would become both the head men’s basketball coach and the athletic director as the university prepared for a fall 1978 tipoff.

Before that, though, the team needed a proper nickname. An administrative committee began posting forms around campus to solicit suggestions, leading many students to discuss possibilities with their friends. One such student was history major Tommy Burns, who suggested “Trailblazers” because the Portland Trail Blazers had just won the NBA Finals. Others thought that title was too long, suggesting shorter nicknames, including “Barons” as an homage to the city’s former (and future) Minor League Baseball team.

But Burns, aptly for his surname, still defended his blazing pick. He suggested the shortened “Blazers”, noting that this was the first major intercollegiate team at the university and they were blazing a new trail for the school. This suggestion was well received and found its way onto the final student ballot in January 1978, along with “Titans”, “Warriors”, and the aforementioned “Barons”. According to Burns himself, the result of the vote was “overwhelmingly in favor of the Blazers”.

After cycling through a few mascots, including this Blazer resembling a lovechild of the Minnesota Vikings logo and Burger King’s King, they landed on a much more standard costumed dragon named Blaze, who debuted in 1996.

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