Is Detroit Mercy the worst college basketball team of all time?

With the NFL season over we at Section 400 are transitioning into the other sports around the calendar.

One of our favorites, college basketball, is in the prime of the season with just a few weeks left until conference tournament play gets underway.

Somehow, someway, nearly 30 games into the season, there is a team up in the Horizon League that has limited itself to the basement. The Detroit Mercy Titans have a record of 0-26.

Head coach Mike Davis’s team is 347th in Division 1 in scoring, 359th in rebounding and 350th in assists per game. The Titans are getting outscored by 18.1 points per game this season and haven’t lost by less than 8 points since January 17th.

Detroit Mercy is a 5.5-point favorite tonight in what is almost positively its last winnable game at home against IUPUI. Yes, Indiana University- Purdue University Indianapolis. The school that was forced to host open tryouts in 2022 because the team only had six eligible players with a month left in the season.

The Jaguars record that season? 3-26; A stain on the underwear that is the Horizon League that could be “oxi cleaned” away if the Jags can force Detriot Mercy into its 27th loss tonight.

Even if the Titans get a win tonight they finish the year against teams at the top of the league. Mike Davis and company are destined to finish either 1-30 or 0-31, which begs the question…. are they the worst college basketball team of all time.

After an admittedly ridiculously long amount of research, here are the four contenders.

2004-2005 Longwood Lancers (1-30)

It’s hard to believe a program that made an NCAA Tournament as recently as 2022 was this bad just a decade and a half earlier. It’s a little easier to believe when you realize the Lancers were in the process of earning Division 1 reclassification.

Longwood earned a 6-point win over Howard for their lone “W” of the year. Unfortunately, the Lancer faithful didn’t get to enjoy it much as the team traveled to Las Vegas shortly after to get pummeled by Northern Iowa, No. 1 ranked Illinois, and No. 17 ranked Cincinnati in the Las Vegas Classic.

Overall Longwood averaged 63.8 points per game while giving up just over 80. While the numbers are eerily similar to Detroit Mercy.

2004-2006 Savannah State Tigers (2-56)

I’m doubling up on back-to-back seasons here because of how purely ridiculous Savannah State’s run in Division 1 was. After going 0-28 in 2004-2005, the Tigers followed it up with a 2-28 season a year later.

Over two years, this team averaged 56.4 points per game while giving up nearly 82. It most notably lost 116-52 to Colorado, 102-40 vs. Memphis, and 83-23 (yes 23) at Oregon.

The Tigers do get a pass because of their pair of wins, the first being against a school called Wilberforce (which sounds like a great Nick. Jr show), and the second being a 1-point nail-biter over old friend Longwood.

2012-2013 Grambling State (0-28)

2012-2013 Grambling State probably gets Detroit Mercy off the hook, but the Tigers aren’t even the worst team of all time due to the pure atrocities committed by the team next on this list.

Coach Joseph Price’s Tigers averaged under FIFTY points per game during the season, losing every single game by double digits until their final game of the season, when the Tigers lost 59-51 to 11-20 Alabama A&M in the SWAC Tournament.

1991-1992 Prairie View A&M Panthers (0-28)

Rejoice, Detroit Mercy, these dudes were most definitely the worst college basketball team to step foot on a court.

These guys did not lose a single game by less than 10 points, most notably losing 115-55 to Central Michigan, 110-49 to UAB, and 120-54 to Tulane.

The Panthers gave up an absurd 99 points per game while only scoring 65. Prairie View lost 12 games by at least 40 points, ending its season with a 112-79 loss to Mississippi Valley State in the SWAC Tournament.

To make matters even worse, head coach Elwood Plummer was retained for the 1992-1993 season, where he led his Panthers to a 1-28 record.

Honorable Mentions

2021-2002 IUPUI (3-26)

2007-08 NJIT Highlanders (0-29) *not far removed from Division III

2010-11 Centenary Gentlemen (1-29) *moved down to Division III in 2011-2012