Tuesday’s Minnesota vs Rutgers Game Will Still Be Historically Bad Basketball

Okay, so Minnesota ruined it. Everyone had been looking forward to seeing two 0-14 (in conference) teams play one another on Tuesday. If that had happened, and the rest of the season played out with the bottom two teams in the conference having a combined 2 wins (against each other), it would’ve been the first time that had happened across any conference since prior to 2000 (in the 2000-2001 season, Middle Tennessee State and North Texas both finished with 1 win in conference, UNT against FIU, MTSU against UNT).

 

But Minnesota had to go and upset a conference foe.  But not just any conference foe, they beat a #6 ranked Maryland team.  Terrible.

 

Instead, we get what used to happen almost annually, but now hasn’t happened since 2012: when the bottom two teams in a conference combine for fewer than 3 conference wins.  Let’s take a look at every game in the last 10 years, and its result:

 

The first game comes from the 2011-12 season in the Ivy League, when 0-9 Dartmouth hosted 1-8 Brown, whose one conference win had come earlier in the season against the Big Green of Dartmouth. Dartmouth took home the win 58-53, their only win in the Ivy League that season.  Brown later went on to upset Columbia, giving them a second conference win, and with it seventh place in the eight team Ivy.

 

The second game comes from 2010-11, and features the Centernary Gentlemen, who have since left Division 1, hosting Western Illinois.  Centenary was 0-16 while Western Illinois came into the game 2-14, with one of the wins coming from an earlier matchup against Centenary. The Gentlemen pulled the upset, snapping a 33 game losing streak, by winning 73-60, giving them their only conference win of the year, and their last win as a Division 1 team.

 

Interestingly, our third game features one of the teams that will be playing on Tuesday. Perennial powerhouse Rutgers, who at the time was in the Big East, with a record of 0-8 vs Depaul, who was also 0-8. Rutgers would win 75-56, then went on to go 2-16 in conference. Depaul went 0-18 before upsetting Cincinnati in the first round of the Big East tournament, which may have been the memory of that tournament if it wasn’t for Syracuse and UConn going 6 OTs in the Quarterfinals.

 

Next comes a Big Ten matchup from the 2006-07 season, when 1-8 Penn State traveled to Evanston to take on 1-9 Northwestern.  Penn State’s only conference win was from the prior matchup against the Wildcats. But this one was a barnburner, going into OT before Northwestern took home the 53-51 win.  Both would end up finishing their Big Ten season with two conference wins.

 

The 2005-06 season had two conferences where the bottom two teams had three or fewer conference wins. First, in the Atlantic 10, St. Bonaventure, 1-12 in conference, faced off at 1-12 Duquesne.  The Bonnies won 77-76 and finished the season 2-14, while Duquesne rounded out their campaign at 1-15 in A-10 play. Meanwhile in the WAC, 1-8 Idaho played the 1-7 Spartans of San José State, whose only win in conference was (you guessed it) a win against Idaho earlier in conference play. SJSU took the win again (72-61), and finished 2-14 in conference, while Idaho finished 1-15.

 

So there you have it. Tuesday’s game may not be the worst in the last 20 years, but it certainly is going to be the worst conference game (when you look at in-conference records, at least, otherwise almost all of the SWAC’s conference play would count) of the year, so Gophers and Scarlet Knights fans, you’ve got that going for you. May the least worst team win!