Rick Barnes wants Vols basketball to remember blowout feeling heading into South Carolina

Rick Barnes got his first chance to watch tape of Tennessee basketball’s clunker at Alabama on an unplanned bus ride from Tuscaloosa to Knoxville.

The Vols coach saw what he expected to see as Tennessee trekked the four-and-a-half hours home after a plane problem. His overall evaluation remained the same as it did immediately after the 78-50 loss: Tennessee was not locked in at all and got what it deserved – its first blowout loss of the season.

“We got beat. We didn’t play well. Plain and simple,” Barnes said. “They might have played as well as they’ve played all year. It happens. I hate it.”

The Vols didn’t follow the scouting report, didn’t compete and “didn’t do anything,” Barnes said Monday. The film cut-ups shown to the players reflected as much, and Barnes didn’t want the reality of how bad their play was casually swept away before the No. 17 Vols (18-6, 8-4 SEC) host South Carolina (13-12, 4-8) on Tuesday (9 p.m. ET, ESPNU).

“I don’t think you ever forget it,” Barnes said. “I think you remember it. If you don’t remember it, it’s doomed to repeat itself. You go in and you just analyze it. You put the tape in.”

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Tennessee has mostly done well bouncing back from a loss this season, having lost back-to-back games only once, in its first two SEC games against Arkansas and Auburn. The Vols rattled off six straight wins after losing to Missouri on Jan. 17 – its most recent loss before Saturday – and the first of which came against South Carolina.

But Saturday was the first loss of its kind for Tennessee, which hadn’t lost in blowout fashion this season and now has a different caliber of defeat to handle.

“You don’t (overreact). You respond to it,” Barnes said. “It’s our job as coaches to point out what we didn’t do, which is quite obvious to them when they watch the tape a second time. And I think they would all tell you it’s hard to watch a game like that, when you know you played that poorly.

“But the fact is it’s not about reacting. It’s about coaching. You just keep trying to get back to doing the fundamental things that win basketball games.”

For the Vols, that gets back to defense above all. Barnes said Tennessee didn’t get “close to being the defensive team we’ve been all year” until 10 minutes into its game against Alabama. That terrible start trickled to the offensive end, where players began chucking jump shots to try to make up a sudden deficit quickly.

“I know how hard we’ve had to play to win games this year,” Barnes said. “And we’ve had to play really, really hard. We did not play hard. We got beat. You show them that.”

Sophomore forward Grant Williams said Saturday that Monday’s practice “will define where our mind is at” before facing the Gamecocks, who have lost five in a row.

“We’ve got another game Tuesday, and we need to get to it,” Barnes said.

Vols seeking redshirt for Kent

Freshman forward Zach Kent is the lone Tennessee player heading for a redshirt this season, which Barnes said the Vols are “working on.”

Kent played in the first two games of the season for Tennessee.

“He’s gotten better,” Barnes said. “He has. He’s gotten better. He had some issues early in the year like any freshman, and you work through it. But, yeah, he’s gotten better, and we think he’s got a great future.”

The 6-foot-10 forward played 10 minutes in the season-opening win against Presbyterian, finishing with four points and two rebounds. He played three minutes against High Point and grabbed one rebound.