LEXINGTON — Whatever happened to that feeling of invincibility Kentucky played with at Rupp Arena?

The eighth-ranked Wildcats' 103-92 defeat to fifth-ranked Tennessee on Saturday marked the third home loss of the season and is another indication that the venerable building no longer boasts the home-court advantage it used to have.

It's definitely a far cry from the 54-game home winning streak that ushered in UK coach John Calipari's tenure in Lexington. The Cats had five unbeaten seasons at home during Calipari’s first seven seasons at the helm. Over the next seven seasons, the Cats were undefeated at home only once — in 2021-22.

Paired with Wednesday’s 94-91 overtime loss to Florida, UK lost consecutive home games for the first time since Tennessee and Arkansas won at Rupp Arena in February 2021. That was the horrid 9-16 season that shall not be mentioned.

For the third time this season, Calipari took to the raised stage for his postgame remarks as audible celebratory screams echoed from the visitor's locker room located roughly first-down yardage away.

"Whether it be losing at home or to teams that are unranked, it’s happening to everybody," Calipari said.

Calipari is sort of right. Teams ranked in The Associated Press Top 10 have lost a record number of games this season to unranked opponents. But it didn't happen to everybody Saturday, especially not the blue bloods of the game.

No. 9 Kansas led start to finish in its 78-65 victory over No. 4 Houston at Allen Fieldhouse. No. 3 North Carolina trailed for all of 16 seconds and led in double figures for most of its 93-84 win over No. 7 Duke at the Dean E. Smith Center.

Let me whisper this part, there's really not much of a difference between the crowd-coined "wine and cheese" in Chapel Hill and the one that sat courtside at Rupp on Saturday. The boosters in both places that consume the best seats from making the biggest donations tend to be older and less likely to be yelling for the sake of making noise.

That's great for adulthood but bad for a home-court advantage.

The atmosphere in the arena hasn't been one to power the team forward lately. And Tennessee didn't allow them a lot of segments to sustain cheers. The Volunteers led by as many as 16 points, never trailed and, really, were never rattled. Not even when the Cats cut their 14-point deficit down to one on Reed Sheppard’s 3-pointer to start the second half.

Tennessee answered with a Jonas Aidoo dunk and Josiah-Jordan James 3-pointer, and Kentucky was only within two possessions of the lead once the remaining 17 minutes.

D.J. Wagner missed his second straight game for UK with an ankle injury. This was the kind of game, in the past, that being at home would have been enough to compensate for being down a starter.

The Vols are in the SEC title race and are Final Four contenders. It's understandable to drop a home game to a team of that caliber. But don't be fooled, the Cats have lost games to some unremarkable teams over the past few seasons, too.

South Carolina finished 12th in the league last season and won at Rupp for just the third time in series history. Last season, Vanderbilt won, too, at Rupp, for the first time since 2007 — and it was on senior night, no less.

The warning sign should have come in December. UNC Wilmington proved it doesn't have to be an SEC foe or a major conference school that can disrespect Rupp Arena — shoutout to Evansville's upset back in the 2019-2020 season. The Seahawks, Calipari's alma mater, handed the Cats their first home loss of the season.

Several reasons have contributed to opponents no longer being intimidated venturing into Rupp. The biggest is the experience that has only been aided by the COVID waiver that allowed players from 2020 an extra year of eligibility.

The Vols’ roster stacks up as 26th nationally in Division I experience, according to KenPom.com. James, who had 26 points, is a fifth-year senior.

Their leading scorer on the season, Dalton Knecht, turns 23 in April. (Knecht had scored 30-plus in four of their last five games, but one of the bright spots for UK defensively was holding him to 16.)

Junior guard Zakai Zeigler hasn’t benefited from an extra year, but just played in his 86th collegiate game for the Vols and has only scored as many as the 26 points he had against UK once.

"Those older guys were the ones that basically got it done; they’ve been in big arenas and loud crowds, and I thought they handled themselves well," UT coach Rick Barnes said.

UK, having dropped three of its last four games, now has to figure out another way to jump-start a late-season push to the postseason because home cooking isn't as filling as it used to be.

Reach sports columnist C.L. Brown at clbrown1@gannett.com, follow him on X at @CLBrownHoops and subscribe to his newsletter at profile.courier-journal.com/newsletters/cl-browns-latest to make sure you never miss one of his columns.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Kentucky basketball: Rupp Arena no longer home-court advantage it was