New uniforms. New starting lineup. New student section.

Old result.

The Tennessee men’s basketball team got a dose of nostalgia Tuesday. The Volunteers 69-68 overtime loss to 9th-ranked Kentucky surfaced unwanted memories for Buzz Peterson.

The loss quickly reminded the third-year coach of his inaugural season.

The 2001 Vols lost eight games by four points or less. Peterson wasn’t ready to revisit history this season.

“That’s what bothers me some,” he said. “I thought we were done with those.”

Early on, a close loss would have been cause for celebration for Tennessee. Down as many as 16 points in the second half, the Vols slowly crept back into the game on the back of their defense.

But it was a defensive breakdown that sent the game into overtime in the first place.

Tennessee was up three with 22.2 seconds left in the game and only had five fouls. A sixth would have run time off the clock without sending the Wildcats to the free-throw line. Peterson wanted his team to foul. What he got was a Cliff Hawkins 3-point shot to send the game to overtime.

He blamed himself for the mistake.

“I told our guys to foul and we didn’t do it,” Peterson said. “That’s something we’ll just have to work on more in practice.

“You’d think that (fouling) would be easy enough to do.”

UT point guard C.J. Watson agreed, but said Hawkins did his part to ruin the Vols’ plans.

“He just shot it before we could get to him,” the sophomore said. “It really hurt us.”

While the last play of regulation did hamper Tennessee’s chances of winning, the first three minutes certainly didn’t help.

Peterson adjusted the Vols’ starting lineup hoping to improve the team’s defense after a poor showing in an 85-64 loss at South Carolina.

But the adjustment backfired. Kentucky started the game on a 10-0 run, with all five scores coming within a foot of the basket.

“I was going with the five guys who showed the best defensive effort (in Monday’s practice),” Peterson said. “I made the decision.”

While defense allowed the ‘Cats to force an overtime, it was Tennessee’s offense that handed Kentucky the win. The Vols only scored four points in the overtime period, only making one field goal.

Tennessee only attacked the basket twice – a missed lay-up by guard Dane Bradshaw and another by center Brandon Crump – with four Wildcat starters each with four fouls.

Peterson said at that point in the game exhaustion prevented an aggressive offensive attack.

“We had exerted so much energy to get back in the game,” he said. “We just didn’t have much left.”

Coming off back-to-back losses, the next test will be seeing if the Vols have enough left to salvage their season.

They’ll get their chance against No. 6 Louisville Sunday.