PISCATAWAY -- His team had just lost by 50 points on national TV, the worst home defeat in 110 years of Rutgers basketball, against a Purdue team that had more rebounds (63) than the Scarlet Knights had points (57).

And somehow, someway, that wasn't the worst part about what is happening here now for young players like D.J. Foreman. Because, as bad as it was on Monday night at the Rutgers Athletic Center, his team has another game in 72 hours on this same court.

Against a better team.

I asked Foreman, who played 35 minutes in this 107-57 loss to 24th-ranked Purdue that was over roughly six minutes after tipoff, how this team can possibly rally with No. 9 Iowa on the way. And this is about as honest an answer as you'll get from an athlete:

"Uh, I guess we just come together and somehow just pray," Foreman said. "That's all we can do."

That's about all that's left for a program that, well, hasn't had much more than a prayer in a long time. I have covered sports in this state for 17 years now, and I honestly can't remember a more hopeless situation than the current state of this Rutgers basketball program.

This team has two more months of nights like this, of Iowa and Michigan State and Michigan and the rest taking their shots, with no reinforcements on the way. Coach Eddie Jordan announced that three top frontcourt players -- Deshawn Freeman, Shaq Doorson and Ibrahima Diallo -- will not return this season. Two games against Minnesota (also 0-6 in the Big Ten) might be the only shots to end a league losing streak that is 21 and counting.

But forget the gloomy present, because losing seasons are nothing new here. Where is the future?

Where is the hope?

You know it's grim when Dick Vitale, the positive former Rutgers assistant, is expressing his disgust on Twitter. Purdue would have won this game if it did not score a point after halftime, and when it was over in barely an hour and 45 minutes, this was an actual exchange at the postgame press conference:

Reporter: Were you disappointed with your defensive effort?

Jordan: No. What was disappointing about the defensive effort?

Oh, I don't know, the whole 107 points thing?

No one wants to pile on Jordan, a good man who was dropped into a horrible situation three years ago. He has represented the university with class, setting a nice example when he went back and completed his degree. He is Rutgers royalty, and nothing will change that.

But he can't survive a season like this, especially if the Scarlet Knights -- who have lost their first six Big Ten games by an average of 27.3 points -- go 0-for-19 in conference play. Not even Colonel Rutgers himself could march back to sidelines after that.

Patrick Hobbs has been on the job as athletic director for less than two months now and spent the first chunk digging out of one crisis in the football program. Now he has another one. Can he really kick the can down the road and risk another winter with scores like this scrolling across America's flat screens?

Jordan has called this a learning season, and maybe that's acceptable in the first year of a rebuilding process. But it's not in Year 3. His defenders point to talented guard Corey Sanders and the injured but sturdy Freeman as building blocks, and yes, they are two good pieces to the puzzle. Transfer Nigel Johnson, who is sitting out this season, is a third.

"This is not gloom and doom right now," Jordan said. "Anyone can paint it anyway they want to paint it, but our guys have a job to do. We stay together, we keep our spirits up, and we move forward."

But how many Big Ten games would a completely healthy Rutgers roster win? Two? Three? Jordan has one recruit for the incoming freshman class, a 6-foot-5 guard out of New York City named Jahlil Tripp who turned down Fairfield and Quinnipiac to come to Piscataway.

Jordan has not made the inroads with the New Jersey high school coaches necessary to bring a real talent infusion. This was always the fear with hiring Jordan, that a lifetime in NBA arenas would make the transition to swimming in the AAU cesspool impossible.

The Scarlet Knights will be better, but these are the five words you never say around this program: "It can't get any worse." Every era is somehow a step down from the one that came before. Gary Waters was run out of town and he looks like Henry Iba now in comparison, those NIT runs the stuff of legend.

And Bob Wenzel? Put a statue outside the RAC, engraved with just "NCAA Tournament coach." That was 25 years ago this March, a quarter century without an invitation to the dance in a sport that invites 68 teams.

"We're not worried about winning and losing right now," Sanders said on Monday night, and give him and his teammates credit for facing questions that they can't possibly answer. "We're worried about getting better."

That's the problem. Rutgers isn't getting better. Iowa is coming to town on Thursday, then it's off to Michigan and Michigan State. Rutgers has two more months of nights like Monday, and then what?

Listen to DJ Foreman. Come together and pray for this team.

Steve Politi may be reached at spoliti@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @StevePoliti. Find Steve on Facebook.