East Carolina football coach Ruffin McNeill counts UAB's Neil Callaway among his many friends in the coaching fraternity. McNeill was playing for the Pirates when Callaway cut his coaching teeth on Pat Dye's staff at ECU in 1978 and 1979. The two will be on opposite sidelines Thursday night as the Pirates take on the Blazers at Legion Field in Birmingham at 8 p.m. (EST, CBS College Sports).

"I graduated from Alabama and Coach Pat Dye had recruited me to Alabama," Callaway recalled. "I wanted to get into coaching. Coach Dye gave me the opportunity to come up there. Back then, they called us part-time coaches. We weren't GAs (graduate assistants). We were part-time coaches. We didn't have to go to school but we didn't make any money.

"I just really appreciated the opportunity Coach gave me up there. I really loved the area. It's a lot like south Georgia where I'm from as far as the rural environment. There were a lot of great kids. The players were passionate about football. Coach Dye had already been there several years before I got there. The kids were hungry. They worked hard and Ruffin was one of those guys. He loved to play the game. He was a very good football player at safety.

"It was a great time in my life. I was young, married. We didn't have any children. I wanted to coach and had the opportunity to be at a great place."

Callaway worked with the offensive linemen at ECU. McNeill remembers when Callaway joined the Pirates staff.

"You knew right from the start he was going to get after it," McNeill said of the Blazers coach. "He was tough, hard-nosed. I've found out that he was that same way as a player. He followed Coach Dye to Auburn and then he went to Georgia. He's done a great job. He's always been a great coach but he's a better person. I have a lot of respect for Neil and what he's done."

McNeill had the opportunity to catch up with Callaway at a Conference USA gathering.

"I sat beside him and it was just like old days," McNeill said. "It was great to see him and great to be around him."

Watson Brown, Callaway's predecessor at UAB, was also a former Pirates assistant, serving on the ECU staff in 1974 and 1975, Dye's first two seasons at the helm in Greenville.

Challenging history in Alabama

The ECU-UAB series has been dominated by the home team with the Pirates owning a 4-1 record in Greenville and the Blazers winning three of four at Legion Field. Other than a 35-10 win at Howard, which is now Samford, in 1965, the Pirates had not won a game in Alabama until topping the Blazers 17-13 in 2008 on a 2-yard scoring run by Brandon Simmons with 2:20 left in the game. Pierre Bell's interception with 1:14 remaining sealed the outcome.

ECU is 0-3 at Auburn and was topped 23-22 by Alabama at Legion Field in 1998 in the Pirates' only matchup with the Crimson Tide. ECU is 0-2 in trips to the Mobile Bowl and 0-1 at the former Papa John's Bowl in Birmingham.

There won't be a lot of crowd energy to draw from when the Pirates go for their third win in Alabama on Thursday night. There were 80,079 at Legion Field for the ECU-Alabama game in '99 but the Blazers have been challenged to develop a sizeable fan base in a state where the Tide and Tigers rule. UAB has been a relative latecomer, starting its football program on the Division III level in 1991. Attendance at the ECU-UAB game in 2008 was 11,453.

Still, McNeill doesn't expect the Pirates to be affected by a small crowd.

"I've heard it will be tough but I think our motivation is us bouncing back from two adverse losses and getting back on the winning track," said the ECU coach.

McNeill said the Pirates (5-4, 4-1 Conference USA) are after the sixth win that would make them bowl eligible.

"We're trying to send our seniors out as one of the winningest classes in East Carolina history," McNeill said. "We want to make sure we improve and get better. There's a lot of football left and a lot of things to improve as a team."

Lewis lining up against former teammate

ECU receiver Lance Lewis said that the Pirates responded well to a previous two-game losing streak by rallying past Southern Miss, 44-43.

"We lost to Virginia Tech and (North) Carolina but we bounced back," said Lewis, who had nine catches for 118 yards and two touchdowns in a 76-35 loss to Navy on Saturday. "This week is just like last week, another heads up. We've got to practice harder and do everything better than we did this week.

"It's tough because we just got embarrassed but we've got to put that one behind us. We've only got a couple of days to prepare but we've got to go harder."

Lewis transferred to ECU after playing at East Mississippi Community College last season. Among his teammates on the junior college level were UAB center Billy Autrey, offensive lineman Quartney Cox and running back Pat Shed, who is the Blazers top rusher at 67.4 yards per game.

Lewis figures he may be matched up in coverage with T.J. Ballou, another East Mississippi CC alumnus.

"It gives me some extra motivation," Lewis said. "We used to go at it in practice. Now we get to go a whole game."

Prescription from Doc

Marshall was a 31-17 winner at UAB last week, the second straight victory for the Thundering Herd.

"UAB's an excellent football team," said first-year Marshall coach Doc Holliday. "The week prior to us playing, they went to Southern Miss and put up 50. They've got great athletes. Number one, you better be able to stop the run. The tailback, Shed, he had (176) yards against Southern Miss. He did a great job. Their quarterback (Bryan Ellis) can throw it all over the place. They've got skilled athletes that can run and get it.

"Defensively, I thought they were one of the best fronts we've played against in the conference. They'll be a great challenge. They've got athletes. They're well coached. They're extremely tough and they play hard. You'll have to be prepared for them or you'll have issues because they're a good team."

Step up to SEC level

Coach McNeill said that the Blazers should have beaten Tennessee and Mississippi State. That means the Pirates will need to play like a Southeastern Conference caliber team to compete with UAB. At least, ECU won't be facing a triple option offense like the buzzsaw that Navy brought to Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium last week.

"You can't get ready for that offense in one week," McNeill said of the Midshipmen's ground-oriented attack.

The Pirates will follow their travel schedule routine, flying out of Kinston on Wednesday afternoon. Because it's a night game, the players will have a little more down time in their hotel rooms between morning and afternoon meetings on Thursday.

The advance forecast for Birmingham on Thursday is calling for sunny skies and a high in the mid-70s during the day with the mercury dropping into the 40s on Thursday night.