Billikens' bricks were an all-time worst

Mike Miller — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 14:35:00 GMT

This is when the writer’s strike really hurts. In less than two weeks, we’ve seen three new records for scoring futility. [Insert raunchy joke here.]

Where’s Judd Apatow when a guy needs him? Even if he can’t write a joke, he could probably make a shot for Rick Majerus. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

First, it was Pennsylvania setting a record for fewest points in a half (6) during a 60-30 loss to Florida Gulf Coast. The Quakers missed every shot in the first 13:15 of the first half, breaking Central Michigan’s record set two years ago against Miami (Ohio). Not since the advent of the shot clock had a team had such trouble scoring.

Nine days later, Savannah State to put on a real (ugly) show.

The Tigers, 12-18 last season, 2-28 the year before and winless in 2004-05, know something about not scoring. But an 85-25 loss to Kansas State was bad even for them.

Savannah State was outscored 48-4 in the second half, making just 1-of-23 field goal attempts. That’s a 4.3 shooting percentage. It got so bad, some K-State fans yelled “mercy bucket,” according to the AP story.

So how does it get any worse? When your opponent has as many blocked shots and steals combined as you do points – and you’re the team with the better record. That’s the truly amazing part in Saint Louis’ 46-20 loss to George Washington on Thursday.

Sure, the Billikens missed 23 consecutive shots. Yeah, they trailed 23-7 at halftime and set the modern record for fewest points in a game.

But this was the A-10 opener for both teams. Neither could’ve expected an outcome like this.

“Sometimes you miss,” Majerus said after the game. “We are a team that has some issues. That is why we are practicing (Friday). We did miss some good shots, yes. Anyone can look at us and see we don’t have height, we don’t have depth.”

Maybe, but this is the same team that beat Southern Illinois in mid-December. The Billikens (9-6) were considered to be part of the A-10 revival, thanks to Majerus’ coaching. The Colonials (4-6) hadn’t beaten a team ranked among the RPI’s top 200 teams all season.

To put it bluntly, this was like nothing we’ve ever seen before.

Consider:

Penn was 4-7, while was Florida Gulf Coast 3-9 entering their game. Both teams were capable of bad night, which is what the Quakers had.
K-State is an NCAA caliber team that played well at home and had an opponent struggle beyond what one would expect.
Even when Air Force held Colorado College (a D-III school) to six points last season, we could even expect a result like that because of the league differential.

The Billikens, meanwhile, put on a performance everyone would like to forget.

Their offensive efficiency for this game was 37.5 on 53 possessions. Their previous low this season was 61.4 in a 61-40 loss to Kent State. Their eFG% was 15.6, half of their previous low, also against Kent State. Both were also worse than Savannah State against K-State.

Ken Pomeroy could confirm this, but it looks like the Billikens put on one of the top five worst offensive displays in history.

The good news? Thank God for the shot clock.

North Carolina trailed Duke 7-0 at halftime during a 1979 loss (Dean Smith’s four corners offense never worked better.) Arkansas State once lost 75-6 to Kentucky in 1945, while Temple lost 11-6 to Tennessee in 1973.

11-6. That’s not even a good football game.

With a little help from his friends

Mike Miller — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 13:23:00 GMT

If VMI is the D-I version of a high-powered offense, then Grinnell College runs on rocket fuel.

And it shot David N. Arsenault right into the NCAA record books -- with the help of his teammates.

Arsenault broke the all-division record for assists in a game Sunday, dishing 34 in a 151-112 win over North Central University of Minnesota. That’s better than Sherman Douglas, Avery Johnson and any other player who’s stepped on a court.

They had to work at it, though. After all, no assist record is made with only the guy making the passes. He’s dependent upon his teammates.

According to the AP story, Grinnell changed up its approach when they found out how Arsenault had 14 assists at halftime. So he dished 20 in the second half, and according to this box score, 12 in the final 10 minutes when Grinnell was already leading by 30.

Two things: Good thing this isn’t the New England Patriots. There would be issues with this style of play. But I digress.

One also wonders if he got a little love from the home-town scorer. Perhaps. I’ll simply gape at the 34 assists and wonder how many of the 600 people at the game know they were watching a bit of history.

(Arsenault ended the game with an assist rate of 68.0, which is assists divided by number of field goals made while Arsenault was on the court. That number, as you might guess, is ridiculously high. Kenpom.com’s ARate leader for the season is East Carolina’s Darrell Jenkins at 51.6, through Monday’s games.)

Grinnell, a small school about 50 miles east of Des Moines in central Iowa, has been garnering headlines for years with their all-out style of play. For more than a dozen years, they’ve been running their version of the run-and-gun, which sees them shoot more than 50 three-pointers a game. Schools like VMI, which changed its offensive philosophy last season, do something similar, but Grinnell is a little different in that it uses 15-17 players, all in short shifts and isn’t dependent on the talent available. The Pioneers play everyone.

The result is an offense that has set all-division records for points in a season (126.2, in 2003-04) and consecutive games with at least 100 points (28, in 2002-03). Other ridiculous numbers? Grinnell once attempted 135 field goals in a game (it had 129 on Sunday), made 32 three-pointers in a game and scored 149 in a losing effort.

(It’s hard to imagine other teams besting these numbers, but it’s true. D-II Troy once took 190 shots in a 1992 game against DeVry (Ga.) and made 102 of them. In the same game, they attempted 109 threes, making 51. Last season, Lincoln (Pa.)’s Sami Wylie hit 21 three-pointers by himself, scored 69 points in a 201-78 win. If all this reminds you of Paul Westhead at Loyola-Marymount, you’d be right. Westhead’s 1990 team with Bo Kimble and Hank Gathers averaged 122.4 ppg. )

And they say teams can’t shoot anymore…

Beyond the Arc : Records

Billikens' bricks were an all-time worst

With a little help from his friends