My dad would probably prefer that I not write this.
He is a diehard Kansas football fan (yes, they do exist) who has missed only two home games in the last 20 years and over that time has traveled to Iowa State, Oklahoma, Ohio and Memphis to watch his favorite team get blown out. If nothing else, my dad is a loyal fan.
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So it was with a look of pain that he received my latest idea: I wanted to determine the worst football programs of the last six decades, just to see if the Kansas teams that he and I watched in the 2010s were really, truly as historically bad as they often felt.
This could have quickly turned into an endless rabbit hole, so I set some parameters for myself: I looked at only Power Five teams, and when in doubt I tried to put particular emphasis on teams that finished in last place in their conference. There were teams that came close to being included, so feel free to disagree and make a case for your own team or a different “worst loss” in the comments.
Now, it’s time to embrace, maybe even appreciate, the sucky-ness…
Kansas’ Gale Sayers runs past, around and through K-State defenders in 1962. (William Straeter / Associated Pres)
1960-69: Kansas State
Last-place finishes: 7
Winless seasons: 3
Winless conference seasons: 5
Overall record: 18-80-1
Conference record: 9-59-1
Number of coaches: 2
Worst loss:New Mexico, 28-8, in 1966. Kansas State lost at home to a team that finished the year 2-8 and would go on to lose its next eight games.
NFL draft picks (first seven rounds): 5
Diamond in the rough: Larry Brown, RB. He averaged 3.6 yards per carry and scored only one touchdown as a senior on K-State’s 1968 squad, but he led the NFL in rushing in 1970, won the MVP in 1972, made four Pro Bowls and is in the Washington football team’s ring of honor.
Fun(?) facts: It wasn’t until 1989 that Sports Illustrated proclaimed Kansas State “Futility U,” but the roots of that futility tree were planted and thrived in the 1960s. In the first six seasons of the decade, the Wildcats played 59 games. They were shut out an almost-unfathomable 22 times. Basically, K-State averaged four shutouts per season over a six-season stretch. Even factoring in the lower scores of the era, that’s incredible.
The high point of Vanderbilt’s decade was a 7-3-2 season in 1974 that ended with a 6-6 tie to Texas Tech in the Peach Bowl. (Associated Press)
1970-79: Vanderbilt
Last-place finishes: 6
Winless seasons: 0
Winless conference seasons: 5
Overall record: 37-71-3
Conference record: 8-51-1
Number of coaches: 4
Worst loss: Tulane, 36-7, in 1977. A Green Wave team that won just three games that season and ranked No. 124 in the country in points allowed held the Commodores to a touchdown.
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NFL draft picks (first seven rounds): 6
Diamond in the rough: Dennis Harrison, DL. Harrison had a long NFL career, making a Pro Bowl and playing on an Eagles team that made it to the Super Bowl.
Fun(?) facts: The case against Vanderbilt is pretty simple: For years and years, the Commodores could. not. win. a. conference. game. They won just two SEC contests in the first three years of the decade. They did not win any in the final four seasons of the ’70s. In fact, Vanderbilt did not win a conference game from 1976 until the third SEC game of the season…in 1981. Honestly, there were probably worse teams in the decade than Vanderbilt, but, man, that is such a demoralizing stretch of conference losing that it deserves to be recognized.
Dennis Green is carried off the field after Northwestern beat Northern Illinois in 1982, breaking a 34-game losing streak. (AP Photo / Charles Knoblock)
1980-89: Northwestern
Last-place finishes: 4
Winless seasons: 3
Winless conference seasons: 3
Overall record: 18-90-2
Conference record: 13-71-1
Number of coaches: 2
Worst loss: Air Force, 62-27, in 1988. The Falcons had just lost to a San Diego State team that finished the season with three wins. Air Force, in turn, would win just five games that season. And that team hung 62 on Northwestern.
NFL draft picks (first seven rounds): 4
Diamond in the rough: Chris Hinton, OL. Hinton was an All American as a senior in 1982. The Broncos drafted him fourth overall but then traded him as part of a deal for John Elway. Hinton went on to make seven Pro Bowls and become enshrined in the Colts’ ring of honor.
Fun(?) facts: In five seasons prior to Dennis Green’s arrival in 1980, the Wildcats had gone 3-51-1. So when Green’s first team went 0-11, it capped a six-year stretch that saw the Wildcats go 3-62-1 and win just two — two! — conference games.
Jonathan Smith and Dennis Erickson finally helped the Beavers turn things around in 1999. (Don Ryan / Associated Press)
1990-99: Oregon State
Last-place finishes: 6
Winless seasons: 0
Winless conference seasons: 2
Overall record: 29-81-1
Conference record: 13-65-1
Number of coaches (including interim): 4
Worst loss: Montana, 22-15, in 1990. Oregon State was booed by its fans at halftime and throughout much of the third quarter — and the team’s head coach, Dave Kragthorpe, defended the booers by saying, “We merited them.” OSU’s fullback said, “I’m embarrassed at the way we played.”
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NFL draft picks (first seven rounds): 6
Diamond in the rough: Reggie Tongue, S. He was an all-conference performer during his final two years as a ball-hawking DB at OSU. Then he played 10 years in the NFL after the Chiefs drafted him in the second round in 1996.
Fun(?) facts: There are probably better cases to be made for OSU teams of the 1970s and 1980s; the Beavers had one winning season over the two decades. But there were some other deserving candidates in those decades, so here we are. When Dennis Erickson’s team went 7-5 in 1999, it was Oregon State’s first winning season since 1970. Meanwhile, the Beavers won just one game four times in the ’90s.
Duke suffered a 12-game losing streak to noted ACC power Wake Forest from 2000-12. (Chuck Burton / Associated Press)
2000-09: Duke
Last-place finishes: 8
Winless seasons: 3
Winless conference seasons: 6
Overall record: 19-97
Conference record: 9-73
Number of coaches (including interim): 3
Worst loss: Richmond, 13-0, in 2006. Duke lost to a Division 1-AA team for the first time in school history and to the Spiders for the first time since…1926. Duke’s leading rusher gained 23 yards. The Blue Devils’ kicker missed two field goals. Duke went 0-12 that season.
NFL draft picks (first seven rounds): 1
Diamond in the rough: Ben Watson, TE. OK, so Watson wasn’t technically a Duke draft pick during this decade, but he did play for Duke as a freshman in 1999 before transferring to Georgia. The Patriots drafted him in the first round in 2004, and he just announced his retirement this year.
Fun(?) facts: Duke had two three-year stretches where the Blue Devils won a combined two games. Not even Kansas managed to pull off that feat. Duke ended in a 23-game losing streak in 2002 and a 22-game losing streak in 2007. Amazingly, the Blue Devils finished 100th or worse in average points allowed in all but one season during the decade. All of which makes what David Cutcliffe has done over the most recent decade all the more impressive: a 10-win season, a 9-win season and six bowl games.
About the nicest thing you can say about the Charlie Weis era at Kansas: It was short. (Tim Sharp / Associated Press)
2010-19: Kansas
Last-place finishes: 9
Winless seasons: 1
Winless conference seasons: 4
Overall record: 21-99
Conference record: 6-83
Number of coaches (including interim): 5
Worst loss: North Dakota State, 6-3, in 2010. The worst loss of the decade was also the first loss of the decade. Not only was the game an eyesore to watch — KU had a whopping 14 first downs, which was still four more than the Bison had — but North Dakota State wasn’t North Dakota State quite yet. The loss got Turner Gill’s first season off to an awful start, but, in hindsight, it was also a fitting way to start the decade.
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NFL draft picks: 6
Diamond in the rough: Chris Harris, CB. Harris played just one season this decade, then he went undrafted, then made four Pro Bowls and became one of the best cornerbacks in the NFL for a time. No one could have seen that coming.
Fun(?) facts: KU won six conference games in the decade. Two of the teams the Jayhawks beat fired their coaches within a week of the losses (Charlie Strong in 2016 and Dan Hawkins in 2010). In each of the last two seasons, teams that KU beat in the non-conference also fired their coaches at the end of the season (Central Michigan in 2018, Boston College in 2019). The Jayhawks lost to North and South Dakota State in the decade and lost twice to Rice.
Kansas was so bad it’s difficult to pinpoint the worst season of the bunch. Was it 2011, when the Jayhawks gave up 600 rushing yards against Georgia Tech, gained 46 yards of total offense in a loss at Texas and got creamed 61-7 by a Texas A&M team that — wait for it — fired its coach two weeks later? Or how about the 2017 season, when KU was shut out in back-to-back games in an era when offenses dominate? And of course there’s the obvious answer, 2015, when David Beaty went winless in his first season and his team was outscored 553 to 183.
KU paid Charlie Weis $12.5 million to win six games and Turner Gill $10 million to win five games.
I admit my bias, but that is a compelling case for the worst decade in college football history. Sorry, dad.
(Top photo: Jamie Squire / Getty Images)
Jayson Jenks is a features writer for The Athletic based in Kansas City. Before joining The Athletic, he covered the Seattle Seahawks for The Seattle Times. Follow Jayson on Twitter @JaysonJenks
