A Century of Tradition: New Year's Edition

While the rest of the country is recovering from New Year's Eve festivities, the college basketball season continues on. There are ten games tonight, including a marquee matchup between 12-1 Villanova and 11-2 Marquette. But we aren't concerned with Big East basketball -- at least, we aren't for this feature. What has BU done on New Year's Day?

Like a lot of other notable dates on the calendar, the Terriers rarely play on New Year's Day. In fact, there's only one game in BU's annals corresponding to January 1st. On the first of 1968, the Terriers trekked down to Philadelphia to square off against Penn in the two teams' only meeting to date. BU lost 75-56. If the Terriers have played other games to open the calendar year, they came in seasons where the records are incomplete -- and there are a lot of those. As late as the 1965-66 season, not all of the date information is complete.

As for New Year's Eve, the Terriers have played twice as many games on that day. Yes, that's two games, but still, it's something. BU's results in those games are somewhat better. The more recent result was a five-point loss to Oklahoma in the Rainbow Classic. The other result? The Terriers' only New Year's victory, a 69-63 win at Richmond.

We'll see what the new year brings for Dennis Wolff's team tomorrow when Holy Cross comes to town. Holy Cross and BU have a long shared history on the basketball court, but it's not one which favors BU. The Terriers are 11-52 all-time against the Crusaders; the 41-games under .500 mark is BU's worst against any team.