KNOXVILLE - The list of Tennessee basketball players who performed well in Saturday's loss at Mississippi State wasn't long, and it didn't include Robert Hubbs III.
There's a good reason for that, though.
The leading scorer for the Volunteers is dealing with a knee problem that has bothered him and limited him in practice recently, and after he was named the Southeastern Conference player of the week following Tennessee's wins against Kentucky and Kansas State, Hubbs scored just 15 points on 4-of-19 shooting in two games last week.
"He's fighting through some injuries and stuff," Vols coach Rick Barnes said Monday, "but you know what, he wants to win. You have days like that. We need Robert. There's no question about it. We're at our best when he's playing great basketball, but we need other guys and we've had other guys that can do some things, too, that they're not doing consistently.
"Robert's a guy that he and Grant (Williams) are really the two guys we want to play through as much as we can. The ball's not getting to them enough late in the shot clock, too. I think too many guys with eight or nine seconds are trying to do things with the ball as opposed to getting them the ball and playing through them late in the clock."
Despite shooting 2-of-12 against Auburn, Hubbs contributed to the easy road win by getting to the free-throw line for eight attempts and chipping in nine rebounds and five assists. He was mostly anonymous at Mississippi State, however, with four points, five rebounds and three assists.
It was just the fourth time this season Hubbs, who averages 14 points per game, failed to score in double figures, and the Vols won just one of those games. They won at Texas A&M when Hubbs netted only six points but lost to Oregon, Florida and Mississippi State.
"He's doing everything he can from his end, and nobody was more down than him after the game," Barnes said.
"I can tell you that, but there's no doubt he's one of our leaders and somebody that we need, but I think it's up to the other guys, too, to understand when a guy that's doing what he has done for us and what he'll continue to do is having a tough day, some other guys need to step up and say we've got to do it now. We haven't gotten that, or we didn't get it Saturday."
Freshman point guard Jordan Bone scored a team-high 13 points against the Bulldogs, but Kyle Alexander, who had six points and three rebounds in the opening minutes before foul trouble limited him to 14 minutes, was the only other player Barnes said played well in Starkville.
The Vols would like to see Bone string together similar performances, but Barnes believes the rookie from Nashville must improve defensively and play sharper when he doesn't have the ball on offense.
"We expect to see him get better game to game now," the coach added. "He missed the nines games, but he's played enough games now that he should be well on his way to understanding what it takes to win and what we have to do and what he has to do. I still think he's learning situational basketball and what we're trying to get done at times, but he's getting better."
Tennessee needs its best player to get better physically with conference standing and postseason possibilities on the line this month, beginning with home contests with Ole Miss on Wednesday and Georgia on Saturday.
"The difference in Robert Hubbs now and when I first got here, he tries like crazy to fight through everything," Barnes said. "He really does. If I ask him how he's doing, and I know when he's not doing great, he says, 'I'm good, Coach. I'm good.' That's probably as big a change as he's made in any areas. He truly to wants to play and wants to win."
Contact Patrick Brown at pbrown@timesfreepress.com.