Conference USA football is 10 years old and is still looking to get on the map.

An Alabama-Birmingham win over Tennessee today would certainly do the trick.

Last year, Louisville grabbed national headlines for C-USA with an 11-1 season foiled only by a 41-38 loss to Miami, Fla.

But now the Cardinals are gone, having moved on to the greener pastures of the Big East and its BCS benefits.

The 12-team C-USA retooled in the offseason to include Marshall, Rice, UTEP and SMU after Louisville, Cincinnati, South Florida, TCU and Army flew the coop.

The C-USA span has the look of an expanded SEC, reaching farther west in Oklahoma (Tulsa) and Texas, dipping down into Florida and heading up the coast through North Carolina (East Carolina) and into West Virginia (Marshall).

"We're in a better structure with 12 teams in all sports in two divisions,'' C-USA commissioner Britton Banowsky said. "We're also more geographically compatible.''

C-USA coaches like the lay of the land.

"I think it's gonna help football,'' said Memphis coach Tommy West, whose school is among six charter members of C-USA. "Losing some of the teams we lost hurts basketball, but it helps football. It will be more competitive now than ever.''

West has a responsibility to keep it that way: Memphis is favored over SEC rival Ole Miss on Monday.

But a win by the 23-point underdog Blazers over UT would garner the kind of attention C-USA dreams of.

UT cornerback Jason Allen said the Vols are ready for a challenge.

"They'll come out like they have something to prove,'' Allen said. "I know some of these guys at UAB, and they could play in the SEC, Big 12 or ACC. They're just as rough and tough as anybody.''

Rice coach Ken Hatfield, who also coached at Air Force, Arkansas and Clemson, said schools better not overlook C-USA teams, particularly early in the season.

"The major difference is the amount of quality depth you have on the roster,'' Hatfield said of the difference in coaching a C-USA school versus a top-25 program. "The first teams, if they stay healthy, can play with anybody and beat any team.''

C-USA schools play at least one team from every BCS Conference looking for money and exposure. The schools know they're not likely to get a return game (though, UT is scheduled to play at Marshall in 2009), but the paydays they get for playing on the road are worth of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Then there's the TV lure. "Anytime, anywhere'' might as well be their motto; C-USA schools have games scheduled every day except Wednesdays.

"We went from where we had 10 games on ESPN last year to having 10 games on ESPN plus our conference championship game, and another 55 games televised,'' Banowsky said.

UT athletic director Mike Hamilton said C-USA teams are an attractive choice when scheduling because of their proximity and quality.

And if UT thinks UAB will be tough today, wait until they play Memphis.

Memphis has traditionally given the Vols trouble. UT kicked a late field goal to score a 19-17 win in the teams' last meeting in 2000. The 1999 Vols, arguably the most-talented team in UT history with seven players chosen in the first 57 picks of the NFL draft that year, needed a Hail Mary pass to score a 17-16 win in Knoxville. In 1996, Memphis scored a 21-17 win over the Peyton Manning-led Vols.

At the time of the '96 upset, many believed C-USA schools had a great advantage in admission standards because they could take a number of non-qualifiers while SEC schools are limited to taking two in each recruiting class.

East Carolina coach Skip Holtz said the advantage some C-USA schools enjoy in that respect is misconstrued.

"Look at all the conferences who say they don't take non-qualifiers, then look at how many junior college players they take,'' Holtz said. "They take non-qualifiers, they just don't take them out of high school. (But) it does give you a little advantage to take them out of high school because you get them for three years instead of two.''

Banowsky said taking non-qualifiers isn't the advantage as it used to be.

"In the old days a conference would put rules in on non qualifiers because schools would bring kids in and after four years they'd be 50 hours short of graduation,'' he said. "The idea you could bring a non-qualifier in and not get them on track to graduate doesn't happen anymore.

"They have to stay on track to graduate and have a good GPA. You have heightened scrutiny around the APR rate, so we're much more sensitive to academic progress.''

In fact, with the addition of Rice, SMU and Tulsa, Banowsky said C-USA ranks in the top two of all conferences for football players' graduation rates.

Now if they can just find their way to the top of the rankings.

A couple of upsets Saturday would help.