NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ – APRIL 23: Eddie Jordan, the former Rutgers star, is introduced as the school’s head men’s basketball coach on April 23, 2013 in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Jordan, who starred in the 1970s with Rutgers and made it to the Final Four in 1976, replaces Mike Rice who was fired after a video surfaced showing him physically and verbally abusing his players during practice. (Photo by Rich Schultz /Getty Images)

Immediately following an embarrassing 50-point loss to Purdue, Rutgers forward D.J. Foreman was asked how the team can rebound to try to pick up its first Big Ten win — or at least remain competitive — against No. 9 Iowa on Thursday. And he gave possibly the saddest answer in the history of sports.

“Uh, I guess we just come together and somehow just pray,” Foreman said. “That’s all we can do.”

Sadly, that sounds like the best strategy for the Scarlet Knights. Despite being at home, they’re 22.5-point underdogs to the Hawkeyes. The KenPom.com statistical rating system has No. 2 Iowa beating No. 277 Rutgers by 21, giving Rutgers just a four percent chance of winning. There will not be a bigger mismatch in conference season this year.

This looks more like a mid-November non-conference game against The University of Incarnate Word than it does a Big Ten game, though that might be unfair — at No. 185 in KenPom, Incarnate Word is nearly 100 spots better than Rutgers.

Rutgers is historically bad for a power conference team. No power conference team has ever been this bad since the KenPom era, and possibly ever. So just how bad are the Scarlet Knights? Let’s explore.

What place would Rutgers be in each conference?

Ben Goren of WNUR Sports founded this test, and he found that the Sun Belt, ranked 18th by KenPom, is the worst conference in which Rutgers would still be the worst team.

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Rutgers wouldn’t even be a contender in the SWAC or MEAC, two conferences that have schools making just $3 million per year (Rutgers, per Big Ten reports, makes $76 million). Put another way, Bo Ryan never finished worse than fourth in the Big Ten while at Wisconsin. Rutgers wouldn’t even finish fourth in the MEAC or SWAC.

Rutgers is the worst team in New Jersey

There are eight Division I teams in New Jersey, but along with Seton Hall, Rutgers is one of two to be in a conference with any sort of national clout. However, the Scarlet Knights still found a way to be the worst team in a state full of MAAC teams.

Here’s the breakdown:

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Rutgers is at least within striking distance of Rider and Farleigh Dickinson, having already beaten the latter this year. However, this is still a MAAC-level team, at best.

Futility by the numbers

Rutgers is 0-6 in Big Ten play, and so far, the Scarlet Knights’ games haven’t been close. The closest game was a seven-point loss to Indiana, but the rest of the losses have come by double digits.

That’s mostly because Rutgers finds itself down multiple scores very often. According to the KenPom conference-only numbers, against an average team and over the course of 100 possessions — roughly a game-and-a-half — Rutgers would give up 127 points while only scoring 87.7 points.

So in just 100 trips down the court, Rutgers would score 40 fewer points than an average opponent. This week’s opponent, Iowa, is not average. The Hawkeyes rank No. 2 nationally in KenPom and No. 9 in the polls.

Better start praying, Rutgers. The worst major conference team in the history of college basketball might find a way to get even worse.

About Kevin Trahan

Kevin mostly covers college football and college basketball, with an emphasis on NCAA issues and other legal issues in sports. He is also an incoming law student. He's written for SB Nation, USA Today, VICE Sports, The Guardian and The Wall Street Journal, among others. He is a graduate of Northwestern University.