The Best Worst Team You Already Don't Remember

No team has ever lost more than 20 games and made the NCAA tournament. The 2016-17 University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Panthers finished with 24 and only came six points short of being the first. Yes, one of the most cringe-worthy basketball teams I have ever watched almost made the NCAA tournament. UW-Milwaukee, nestled into the upper east side of Chicago's little sister, finished with an 11-24 record, dead last in the mid-major Horizon League they play in. One quick look and anyone would assume they just were a bad team . Those people would be absolutely correct, but that piss-poor playing squad were a pair of threes from breaking a record no one really wants to have. The kicker? I go there.

As a student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, I can personally attest that no one at all goes to any sporting events. They'll get the freshman to shuttle down and give them free food offers in their dorms, but besides the eager, naive younglings, attendance never looks like it even hits triple digits. It's not like the Panther Arena, formerly the Mecca where the Bucks used to play (and hosted the All-Star Game in 1977), is a bad or uninviting venue at all; it's simply that no one really cares about how their school team is doing unless it personally affects them. At a school of 30,000 with maybe half of that online or commuting students, school pride isn't at all like it was when I attended Marquette University. At Marquette, EVERYONE shows up. That's why we sold out the Bradley Center multiple times a season and they always finish Top 25 in attendance. Even my freshman year, where we finished a humbling 8th out of 10 teams in the Big East, everyone pregamed and showed up and yelled their hearts out. Here at UWM, it's more common to hear "Wait, we played yesterday?" For a team with a new head coach in his first year of being a head coach ever, mediocre recruits, and only one player with starting experience on the entire roster, this team was doomed from the start. That is, until March Madness sunk in.

Let's summarize this rough fairytale season in one paragraph. They had double-digit losses in a row to Memphis, DePaul and East Tennessee State, then wins from UC-Irvine, Jacksonville and Montana State but also dropped games to Montana, Loyola of Chicago, Ohio, Western Illinois, and Belmont during their non-conference stretch. If you're keeping track, that's 4-9 for out of conference play, a horrid start a mid-tier mid-major team. It only got worse, as they went 4-14 in conference play, including ten losses in a row leading up to the conference tournament. Three of the four wins came against Detroit, Youngstown State and Cleveland State, the #7, #8 and #9 seeds in the tournament, respectively. The sole win against a team with a winning conference record was Northern Kentucky, who they'd have a mighty battle with in the conference tournament.

Here's where the Cinderella story begins. As the #10 and last seed, they had to play #7 Detroit in the first round of the Horizon League tournament. Sophomore backup PG Jeremiah Bell had the game of his life going 9-10 on FG's, 9-11 on FT's and scored 31 points (well above his 6 PPG average) to lead UWM to a 25-point victory. Upset #2: one of the ugliest games I have ever watched. In the Quarterfinals against #1 Valparaiso, who everyone else in the Horizon League is sick of seeing win, neither team shot above 32% and despite being out-rebounded by double digits, Senior SG Cody Wichmann from beloved Pulaski, Wisconsin became the only double-digit scorer down the stretch and they squeezed out a 43-41 mega-upset. Next up was the Semifinals against Illinois-Chicago, and as you guessed it, another game means another player stepped up. This time it was two players, as G Brock Stull and F Brett Prahl combined for 32 Points, 3/3 from beyond the ark and 14 Rebounds as the tag-team led to a 74-68 upset of the Flames to get to the Conference Championship. Suddenly, everyone can see a horrid UW-Milwaukee team play on ESPN for a chance to make it to the Big Dance.

A 53-59 loss. One game away, 40 minutes away from becoming the first team with more than 20 losses to ever make the NCAA Tournament, and they lost by six. Brock Stull and Brett Prahl once again were clutch down the stretch, shooting 12/25 on FG's (48%) 2/4 from beyond the arc, 5/5 from the free throw line and 31 points. Lead changes were going back and forth, and them one man missed a few too many shots. That man was Pulaski High graduate, a player I personally played against in high schoo, senior SG Cody Wichmann. He shot 2/11 on FG's and 1-7 from beyond the arc. Pulling out the calculator, that's 18.2% Field Goal and 14.2% Three-Point. That's bad. Very bad. Very bad and exactly when we needed someone to start making baskets. Sure, they gave up too many open looks for a Northern Kentucky team that only shot 41.5% FG and lost the turnover war. Having a -8 Rebounding ratio and shooting worse percentages on FG and 3PT, UW-Milwaukee dug themselves a hole, but if the Senior guard, the only player on the entire team that made a start before this season, shot at least his career average of 39% (195/500 3PT at UW-Milwaukee), that's two more three pointers. 2x3? 6. How many points did we lose by? 6. Just two three pointers from the veteran Cody Wichmann would have made college basketball history forever.

A 53-59 loss brought an end to a horrible season. Yes, they were six points away from a David vs. Goliath story, but this was undoubtedly a BAD team. A rookie coach in his first season of being a Head Coach ANYWHERE, following a coach that left on scandalous terms, and only Cody Wichmann, the villain in this almost-Cinderella story, had made a single start before this campaign. UW-Milwaukee had zero quality wins and more than a handful of bad, simply stupid losses. At the end of the day, the Panthers finished 11-24, and anyone outside of the 53211 will easily forget about being a pair of threes away from NCAA history. Everyone has gone back to cheering on Wisconsin and maybe Marquette during March Madness, and all of the students are deeply engrossed in their midterms again. It's already forgotten. It wasn't "what was" this year, it was "what almost was," and at a school where nobody really cares about the athletic programs whatsoever (Hell, we don't even have a football team), everyone outside of the actual team will even remember the tournament glory run once spring break hits. This being said, I'm not expecting anyone outside of UWM to remember the 2016-2017 basketball almost-miracle, let alone the students that go here, but have it be written in the history of FullerMetrics that a god awful college basketball team in the marvelous city of Milwaukee almost pulled off one of the biggest feats in college basketball history.