Tomorrow afternoon in Birmingham, the Dogs hope to remain atop the CUSA West as they take on the Blazers from UAB. Each week, I'll take a look at the opponent and offer some last second advice on how to win the game. Hopefully the coaches are reading!

1) Beep....beeep....beeeeeep....

Look, I'm not going to beat around the bush this week. UAB is good. They've got a very talented defense, and a pretty solid run game. Bill Clark gets his guys ready to do enough to win football games, and that's really what matters. But while the mighty Blazers defense is ranked in the top 15 in a bunch of categories (See Nathan's Stat Attack piece for more on this), they've wracked up stellar stats against one of the absolute worst schedules imaginable. In games against teams with a pulse: WKU, USM, and Tennessee... guess what? The Blazers folded up the tent and lost. If the Dogs want to win this week, they simply need to have a pulse offensively. WKU won and only put up a little over 220 yards! No one is asking Tech to put up 600 yards of offense. Just... have a pulse and we'll be okay.

2) Win the turnover battle

Last week's game against Marshall served up a humbling reminder that to win big games, you've got to win the turnover battle. Tech's fumble on their own goal line, the bad snap, and the INT going in to Marshall's end zone were enough to drive a Tech fan crazy. But they were also enough to turn a close game into a blowout. This week, Tech faces an opponent in UAB that gives up more turnovers than they create. The Blazers come into the game ranked 94th in turnover margin (-4). With that being said, though, UAB does force a lot of fumbles (13). Their problem is that Tyler Johnston is a feast or famine type of Quarterback who throws a lot of 50/50 balls. Amik, Michael Sam, and Jay Sneed: hope you've got some stickum on your gloves, the ball's coming to ya!

3) Stop the run!

One of the keys to beating Marshall was to bottle up Brendan Knox. While the Dogs didn't win that game, the defense actually did a pretty decent job with the Thundering Herd's feature back until late in the game when they got tired. The Blazers will look to get their starting running back Spencer Brown going again after an injury slowed him down for the second half of the season. So far this year, Brown is averaging just 3.7 yards per carry, but he'll look to have a good night against the Bulldog defense. Outside of Spencer, another Brown has actually led the Blazers' rushing attack this season: Jermaine Brown Jr., who has 70 carries for 360 yards (5.1 ypc). The Dogs will have to stop the rushing attack in order to force Tyler Johnston III to pass the ball as much as possible.

Evan is also a contributor for gtpdd.dog, a lighthearted Louisiana Tech blog. Be sure to follow @gotechplsdntdie on Twitter for more!