How unlikely was Marquette’s win at Providence?

By now, I’m sure you’ve gotten your fill of Markus Howard articles, and lost in the (much deserved) hoopla, was just how stunning Marquette’s win actually was. No, Providence wasn’t a title contender and uber favorite, and it was missing one if it’s best players, but just based on the pure numbers, it was one of the 6 most unlikely victories in the past 8 years. 

I took to KenPom and went through all of the box scores for the Win Probablility charts since the 2010 season looking for games Marquette won where it had less than a 5% chance of winning at any point. Here they are:

At Providence 1/3/18, 3.1%

Vs. Villanova 1/24/17, 1.1%

At Providence 1/5/2016, 4.6%

 At Georgetown 1/20/2014, 3.8%

At Davidson 3/21/13, 4.6%

Vs. UConn, 1/3/2013, 3.0%

I’m not sure what it is about January, but 5 of the 6 fall in the Year’s opening months. All in all, the win on Wednesday was Marquette’s 3rd most unlikely win of the past 8 years.