Tennessee men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl said his entire team shares the blame for Saturday night's 88-74 loss to LSU.

A quick look at the box score shows UT's leading scorer, Chris Lofton, was held to a career-low two points -- nearly 15 below his season average.

But he won't hear another word about it from Pearl.

"Chris is harder on himself than any other person is,'' Pearl said. "He's probably too hard on himself.''

In fact, Pearl said, the Vols' offense was not the biggest problem he saw when reviewed the game tape.

"We scored 74 points, we shot 53 percent in the second half," Pearl said Sunday. "It wasn't our offense. It was we couldn't stop Glen Davis inside.''

Davis scored 18 of his 24 points in the second half as the Tigers built on a 30-27 lead and staved off a UT rally that brought the Vols to within 46-44.

"If you want to lay blame, this team has got to defend better,'' said Pearl, whose team entered the LSU contest as a 7-point underdog. "If we want to be the type of team everyone hopes we can be, you've got to rebound and defend better.''

Pearl said he accepts Lofton having an off night shooting (1-of-7) because it happens to everyone.

"Chris has to understand there will be nights when shooters don't shoot well or defenses take him away,'' Pearl said. "Chris can't let it affect the rest of his game. He didn't rebound last night, he didn't play as well defensively.

"We need to win on a night when he doesn't shoot as well.''

Defense, Pearl believes, is the key.

Against LSU, Pearl said the Vols had little choice but to press and take their chances with the Tigers' transition game. The result was six LSU dunks and numerous layups.

"We chose to really extend our defense and make them play away from the basket because of their size advantage,'' Pearl said. "It paid off in that we did turn them over (25 times), but we weren't able to convert on those turnovers.

"Secondly, you could say maybe I could have kept the scoring down so we could have been closer in a lower scoring game. But I looked at the charts, and we couldn't stop them in the half court or the full court.''

Bottom line, Pearl said, whether in the half or full court, the Vols need to tighten up on the ball.

"We've got to be aggressive and make plays and turn people over, and we lead (the SEC) in turnovers and steals,'' Pearl said. "But we can't be last in rebounding and field-goal percentage defense and finish where we'd like to finish.

"Those numbers must improve in order for us to make this a special season instead of just a really good start.''

The Vols are 11-2 overall and 2-1 in the SEC, but even more impressively, are No. 8 in the RPI ratings.

The bad news for UT is that Wednesday night's opponent, Memphis, is 15-2 and has an RPI of No. 2 and Saturday night's foe, Florida, is 16-0 and is No. 6 in the RPI ratings.