COLUMBIA - Missouri basketball still has one ignominious streak to break.
The Tigers (7-18, 2-11 Southeastern Conference) broke a 13-game losing streak and 14-game conference losing streak Feb. 4 against Texas A&M. They've even added a 20-point home win against Vanderbilt since. But their 32-game true road game losing dating back to Jan. 28, 2014, is still active.
Missouri head coach Kim Anderson has three chances left this season to get his first true road win with the Tigers, starting at noon today at Tennessee (14-12, 6-7 SEC).
Tennessee comes into today's game as losers of three of its last four games, including an 83-58 loss at No. 13 Kentucky on Tuesday. Missouri beat Tennessee 75-64 last season in Columbia.
Guard Robert Hubbs III leads the Volunteers with 14 points per game followed by forward Grant Williams' 12.3 clip. Williams' 5.4 rebounds per game leads the club.
Missouri looks to rebound from a 57-54 loss to Alabama on Wednesday.
A 5-for-24 first half field goal percentage limited Alabama's scoring early on, but the Tigers only led 23-18 at halftime.
"We felt like maybe we could be up by five or six more points," guard K.J. Walton said. "But we didn't play that well leading out the half. We still had a five-point lead at the start of the second half and we felt good about that."
Alabama came back to tie it late in the second half. Back-to-back 3s from Alabama's Dazon Ingram gave Alabama a 53-47 lead with 4:35 left that Missouri could not come back from.
The Tigers came within a point of the Crimson Tide but could not tie the game.
"I think the ball after the out of bounds call and those two 3s, it was pretty much in their court at that point," Missouri forward Kevin Puryear said. "It pretty much changed the momentum of the game and gave them all the momentum. At that point we were trying to claw back and didn't make the plays we needed to make, turned the ball over a couple times, didn't get the rebounds we needed too.
"Winning by close margins like that comes down to the little things, and that's what we messed up on down the stretch."
Wednesday's game was the fifth time Missouri blew a halftime lead in a losing effort in 13 conference games this season.
"We just don't have that big a margin of error," Anderson said after the loss. "We can't afford to make mistakes, whether they be physical or mental and expect to beat a good team. We fought off a run but we couldn't fight off a second run."
Forward Jordan Barnett was held to only five points against Alabama after scoring 23 points each in the previous two games. The transfer from Texas has led the team in points per game since becoming eligible Dec. 20 and has been coming off the bench the last four games.
"I never thought Jordan got started," Anderson said of Barnett's game against Alabama. "I thought he just never got comfortable, and you do credit Alabama with part of that. I never thought Jordan got going or comfortable shooting the basketball."