You know that nightmare you have when you keep firing wide open 3-pointers in a big game, only every single shot clangs off the rim embarrassingly? Well Dayton just played an entire game walking through that nightmare, with one notable exception: Instead of losing their shorts at the end, they beat an SEC opponent.

(All that dribbling work didn’t help Dayton behind the arc.)

Dayton broke the previous NCAA record for most missed three-pointers in a game, bricking 24 in a 60-59, overtime win over Auburn in the Chicago Invitational Challenge on Friday night. Dayton guard Marcus Johnson missed a team-high five threes by himself, yet still led the Flyers with 16 points, eight of them in overtime. That’s right, he missed five 3-pointers and led his team in scoring. And his name isn’t Allen Iverson.

As bad as Dayton was from behind the arc, Auburn missed 24 3-pointers of its own, too. The Tigers hit seven of 31 from deep, and the two teams missed the first 29 shots taken from 3-point land. According to the DAYTON DAILY NEWS, neither coach could say much in favor of long-range accuracy.

“I’ve been around a long time, and I don’t think I’ve seen an 0-for-24,” Auburn coach Jeff Lebo said.

As for Dayton head coach Brian Gregory? Remember that line Barack Obama used about, “putting lipstick on a pig,” in the middle of the campaign? Listen to this quote with a healthy dose of “oink, oink.”

“Our guys stuck with it and gutted it out,” Gregory said. “It wasn’t pretty. But when you beat an SEC team on a neutral court, it’s hard not to call that pretty.”

Really? Missing 24 threes is pretty? Under any circumstances? We beg to differ. And the DAYTON DAILY NEWS coverage extolling how the Flyers owned the glass? That’s pretty faint praise when you can’t hit a shot.

So, what did we learn from all this? Well, we learned that Dayton is probably not going to be the annual Atlantic 10 surprise contender come late March (let’s just call it the Xavier role, shall we?). Just as significantly, we learned that Auburn is atrocious. No surprise there. Evidently the Tigers are going for an athletic department-wide theme from the looks of how that football game against their arch rival is panning out.