Rebounding is taking on a little different meaning for the Tennessee men’s basketball team this week.
The Volunteers were obliterated Saturday afternoon at Rupp Arena in Lexington, falling 107-79 to a locked-in Kentucky that shot 67.9% from the floor. The 28-point mauling matched a 78-50 setback at Alabama in February 2018 as the most lopsided defeats of the Rick Barnes era.
Never had the Wildcats amassed as many as 107 points in any of the previous 232 series meetings.
“I thought they played as well as I’ve ever seen them play, to be quite frank,” Barnes said Monday in a news conference, “but there were a lot of things we didn’t do. Our defense was not very good. Our one-on-one defense wasn’t there at all. We’ve got to get more from really everybody.
“Our starting front line didn’t have one rebound in the game in 38 minutes between them, and that can’t happen. It goes back to consistency and knowing what you’re going to get every single night and what you’re going to have to do to get that.”