ESPN Forde

LEXINGTON, Ky. -- For the Bust of the Year in college basketball, the 13th loss of the season had an oddly ennobling quality about it.

The LSU Tigers came into their Fat Tuesday game at Kentucky with a fat chance of winning. Yet, lacking injured star center Big Baby Davis on the road and facing a team that, at least theoretically, should have been desperate to win, LSU fought the good fight. After 35 minutes in Rupp Arena, the Tigers had played the Wildcats to a 58-all standstill.

In the end, a Kentucky team with serious issues of its own pitched a four-minute shutout at LSU, took a 68-58 lead and wobbled off with a 70-63 win.

For once, though, the Tigers could walk away from a defeat without embarrassment dogging their every footstep.

"I thought our team played hard and played with some heart. … I thought our guys played well," LSU coach John Brady said.

Brady's guys played above expectations -- in part because they've done so much to lower them during this dreadful encore to a Final Four season.

From a No. 5 preseason ranking to No. 100 in the RPI before this latest loss, no team has fallen further and faster than LSU. A 13-4 start has spiraled into a 14-13 disaster, including a league-worst 3-10 mark in the Southeastern Conference. In a Western Division that nobody wants to win very badly, LSU has shockingly slid out of contention.

The Tigers have lost nine of their last 10, and the next chance to turn that around is against defending national champ Florida -- which, if Davis doesn't play, could be a bloodbath. Even in Baton Rouge.

It's not out of the realm of possibility that LSU might have won its last game of the 2006-07 season. Brady said his team has brought commendable effort to the gym every game, but facts are facts: The Tigers could plummet from the Final Four one year to sub-NIT the next.

"I detest where we are," Brady admitted. "I don't sleep at night, I don't eat well -- but my wife loves me and she's getting me through that.

"Unmet expectations is a terrible place to be. I take all the responsibility. I don't put anything on the players.

"It's just one of those experiences I've never been in in my coaching career, and here it is hitting me in the face."

In the past month, Brady has been hit in the face more than Tex Cobb. His team is guard-poor and lacks leadership. Not coincidentally, it simply cannot find a way to execute well enough to win a close game.

LSU's last seven defeats all have come by single digits, with an average losing margin of 4.3 points.

"The only thing you can say is that I haven't coached them well enough," Brady said. "You can write a column on what you think, but that's all I'm going to say. I'm not going to go into a dissertation about this or that. The bottom line is I haven't gotten them what they need to finish a game. Last year we won every close game. I've never been in this situation."

Last year LSU won its last seven games decided by eight points or less, including two in that NCAA Tournament run to Indianapolis. But last year LSU also had guard Darrel Mitchell to hit the big shot, make the key assist and take charge in the team huddle.

Without Mitchell and lottery pick Tyrus Thomas, the Tigers have lost their mojo. This shouldn't have happened -- not with Davis coming back as a projected first-team All-American, plus fellow returning starters Tasmin Mitchell and Garrett Temple, plus touted transfers Terry Martin and Dameon Mason.

But it has.

Point guard play has been a critical deficiency. Brady was hoping for improved performance from junior Tack Minor, whose season-ending knee injury in 2005-06 might have been addition by subtraction. He didn't get it. A career shoot-first, pass-later guy, Minor shot just 37 percent from the field in 16 games -- mostly coming off the bench -- before being dismissed from school at the end of January. Nobody else has adequately filled the quarterback role.

LSU's lack of steady ballhandling was never more evident than late in the first half Tuesday night. The Tigers already had seen a 16-point lead whittled to nine when they incurred a 10-second backcourt violation against Kentucky's pressure.

During that sequence nobody wanted to dribble through Kentucky's defense -- especially not Mason, who appeared to have half the court to advance the ball past the time line but wouldn't take it. That 10-count sent Brady several feet out onto the court, screaming at his own players, which resulted in a sideline warning from the officials.

When the seated Brady then barked something at the refs, he was hit with a technical foul. Just like that, the coach killed what was left of his team's momentum.

Kentucky hit both free throws, then followed with a 3-pointer to make it 31-27. The Wildcats scored the last three points of the half to cut the lead to a point. In the pantheon of T's that damaged your team's chance to win, this one deserves a spot.

"I'm 52 years old," Brady said. "I started coaching when I was 21. That's the first time I've gotten a technical foul sitting on the bench. Normally, I'm standing up."

Note that Brady did not deny yelling at the officials when he got banged for the T. Thing is, it was his own team's incompetence that sent him hurtling onto the court to begin with.

"I wasn't yelling at the officials," he said. "It doesn't do any good to yell at 'em. They don't listen."

On the other bench, Kentucky coach Tubby Smith can be forgiven if he wonders whether his players have stopped listening to him. If this game ennobled the loser, it also underscored the deficiencies of the winner.

The Cats once again came out for the opening tip like a team bored with basketball. For the fourth straight game, Kentucky fell into a double-digit first-half hole.

You literally could see it coming. Before taking the court for pregame introductions, as the Kentucky band got the 23,828 Rupp denizens roaring, the Wildcats gathered limply under the stands. A single player -- senior Lukasz Obrzut -- clapped his hands. Junior Randolph Morris gave a couple of half-hearted whoops in time with the clapping.

And that was it. Nobody else said anything or did anything to give any evidence of enthusiasm.

This was a team motivated to end a three-game losing streak and a frustrating run of soft first halves? Hardly. I've seen more fire from a Tuesday night canasta group.

Little wonder that UK quickly fell behind 28-12 -- against an unraveling opponent that was lacking its best player. Yet Smith said this latest slow start was not attributable to lethargy.

"I thought they played hard," he said.

This disconnect is part of the reason Kentucky fans are reaching the end of their patience with Smith -- a coach with a very good record at a school that long ago developed a craving for greatness. If Kentucky hadn't finished the comeback and won, this could have been the game that tipped the scales of public opinion permanently in favor of a firing.

As it is, March will be the proving ground for this Kentucky team and its coach -- which, barring a miracle run in the SEC tournament, is better than the national Bust of the Year can hope for.

Pat Forde is a senior writer for ESPN.com. He can be reached at ESPN4D@aol.com.