Eastern Michigan ties NCAA record by scoring 4 first half points

Eastern Michigan tied the Division-I record for fewest points in a half during the shot clock era Monday night when it went to the locker room trailing host Rutgers by a score of 31-4. The Scarlet Knights would go on to win by a final score of 63-36, but that storyline was obviously of secondary importance.

Let’s take a quick look at all the amazing facts from this historic performance.

—Eastern Michigan tied a record which had been previously set in 2013 when Northern Illinois scored four points in the first half of a game ... against Eastern Michigan. Jon Bois was watching and celebrated the awfulness of the performance afterward.

—That game between Northern Illinois and Eastern Michigan was played on Jan. 26, 2013. Embarrassingly, NIU’s 4-point first half output broke the previous record for fewest points in a half ... which had been set by the Huskies themselves just 56 days earlier when they scored five points in a half against Dayton.

—Eastern Michigan scored the first four points of the second half on Monday, and did so in just 56 seconds. The Eagles actually made their first three field goal attempts of the second half after going into halftime just 2-for-25 from the field.

—Yes, the Eagles were a woeful 2-for-25 from the field, but perhaps more improbably, an imperfect 0-for-7 from the free-throw line.

—Eastern Michigan still missed its first free-throw of the second half, but connected on its second attempt.

—The Eagles wound up scoring a whopping 32 points in the second 20 minutes, the same number of points Rutgers did in the half.

—Eastern Michigan actually entered the evening with a record of 4-1 with its only loss coming at the hands of the No. 1 team in the country, Duke. In that loss, the Eagles were held to just 13 first half points.

—Rutgers entered the night at No. 133 in Ken Pomeroy’s rankings. Eastern Michigan was No. 123.