NEW YORK — It's difficult to find much optimism about the current state of the Rutgers basketball team.

The Scarlet Knights' season came to a merciful end with an 80-68 loss to Minnesota in the first round of the Big Ten tournament on Wednesday night. Rutgers (10-22, 2-16 Big Ten) finished the season on a 15-game losing streak that featured numerous blowouts.

Coach Eddie Jordan has a 22-43 record in two seasons at his alma mater. With top scorers Myles Mack and Kadeem Jack graduating and a lack of competitive facilities hampering recruiting, Jordan is facing an uphill climb to turn around a program that hasn't reached the NCAA Tournament since 1991.

But despite all of those forces, a handful of prominent college basketball analysts expressed faith this week in Jordan's ability to get the program on track.

"I like his basketball mind, his acumen, his history. I think he's going to be fine," said former Ohio State star Clark Kellogg on Tuesday at CBS Sports and Turner Sports' NCAA Tournament media day. "I'm not watching him in a coaching setting, but what he's done in the game and what he's seen and experienced playing and coaching at every level, I just think he's the right guy."

Naturally, Kellogg, who is a studio analyst for CBS, pointed to recruiting as the key to Jordan's fate. That sentiment was echoed by a number of other analysts, including TNT's Kenny Smith.

"(Jordan is) a Rutgers legend. He's been a great coach for a long time. He can get it turned around," said Smith, who starred at North Carolina in the mid 1980s. "He has great connections in AAU. He actually coached AAU before he got back into the league so he has a good pulse on recruiting. Once he gets the players in, he has the ability to coach them. But the first part of being a great coach is great recruiting."

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There's a great deal of emphasis placed on Rutgers' ability to keep home the top New Jersey talent in football. Bill Raftery, CBS' lead college basketball analyst, said the focus should be just as intense for Jordan.

"I think if he can keep kids in New Jersey it would be a big thing for them," said Raftery, a Kearny, N.J., native who coached Seton Hall from 1970-81. "Every team you look at, there's somebody (from New Jersey)."

Of course no Rutgers basketball recruiting conversation can avoid the facilities elephant in the room. The lack of a dedicated practice facility puts Rutgers far behind most of its Big Ten peers.

"That is the difficulty they're going to have," said CBS analyst Len Elmore, who starred at Maryland in the early 1970s. "Going into the Big Ten, you've got to have facilities that can compete. Rutgers is going to have to spend a lot of money to compete with Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State and Wisconsin in football and basketball. Look at Maryland. Maryland has gone deeper in debt to be able to compete in football. It's a boon to get the Big Ten money and to have that prestige, but it certainly will be a detriment to them as they try to run their athletic programs in the black."

These are the same issues that have always plagued Rutgers, which hasn't been a national contender since Jordan led the Scarlet Knights to the Final Four in 1976 as a player. The question hanging over the program is if Jordan can achieve similar success as a coach.

"It's going to be an uphill battle. There's a lot of headwind," Kellogg said. "Outside of Eddie Jordan's group, there hasn't been a ton of history and tradition there so he's building this thing from scratch in the Big Ten. So it's going to take some time, but I think he's a guy that can do it."

Dan Duggan may be reached at dduggan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @DDuggan21. Find NJ.com Rutgers Football on Facebook.