The misery didn’t begin with repeated beatdowns. Or with capitulation and a lack of competitiveness.

Instead the losing began slowly, but quickly gained enough momentum to turn a somewhat encouraging run through the nonconference schedule into the eighth 20-loss season in the history of the Colorado men’s basketball program. And the worst campaign record-wise in 15 seasons under head coach Tad Boyle.

A win against two-time defending national champion UConn at the Maui Invitational in November spurred possibilities of a higher ceiling for a team picked 15th in the Big 12 Conference preseason poll, even if the Buffs were routed in the tournament’s other two games against Michigan State and Iowa State.

The Buffs played tough against third-ranked Iowa State in the Big 12 opener, but then the losses mounted. A failure to show up at Arizona State. A turnover-filled spectacle in an otherwise winnable battle at Central Florida. Two games at home fumbled away late against West Virginia and Cincinnati. All of the sudden the Buffs looked lost while setting the stage for an 0-13 start in Big 12 play, the second-longest losing streak in program history.

How did it go so wrong? Let us count the ways.

Confession time for me. I certainly thought this team would be better than what it showed. When the preseason poll was released, I declared this team wouldn’t finish 15th. Hey, technically I was right, as the Buffs finished last in the first 16-team version of the Big 12. At least CU was one of the last eight teams standing at the Big 12 tournament, but the final standings speaks for itself.

To be clear, I wasn’t so delusional I thought this would be an NCAA Tournament team. Or even an NIT team. But 15th? That’s an incredibly low bar, and one I thought they could clear. There’s a track record of Boyle’s Buffs knocking off some of the elite teams in their conference at home, even in down years. I thought the Buffs would sneak up and get one of them at the Events Center. Maybe not Houston, but one of them. That obviously didn’t happen.

As Boyle stated a few times during the struggles, I thought this would be a much better 3-point shooting team than the Buffs showed. It required a decent showing in CU’s three Big 12 tournament games just to nudge the Buffs to a .322 mark, tying the 2022-23 team for the second-lowest 3-point percentage in Boyle’s tenure, second only to the .318 mark posted by the 2013-14 team. Both of those other teams dealt with extenuating circumstances that aren’t excuses for this year’s team. Two years ago, CU’s best 3-point shooter, KJ Simpson, saw his numbers drop significantly as he dealt with injury and then illness through the bulk of the Pac-12 schedule. In 2013-14, the Buffs’ best 3-point shooter, Spencer Dinwiddie, owned a .413 mark before a midseason knee injury ended his season.

Physically, the Buffs were outclassed on most nights. At both ends of the floor, and at every position. CU’s guards couldn’t contain the bigger, more athletic backcourts in the Big 12. Same in the frontcourt. Buffs players at every position routinely were picking themselves off the floor while the opposition was running the other way with a numbers advantage. That has to change if the Buffs hope to crawl out of the Big 12 basement.

And then there were the turnovers. All sorts of them. CU averaged 14.4 per game, the most of Boyle’s tenure. The Buffs actually finished seventh in league games in overall field goal percentage, which seems doubly impressive given their .290 Big 12 mark from the arc. Yet the illusion of a somewhat effective offense was shattered by the consistent inability to protect the ball.

The coming week will be interesting, and critical, in outlining the roadmap back to possible respectability. Among the potential returnees, a core of Bangot Dak, RJ Smith, Felix Kossaras, Sebastian Rancik, Assane Diop and a bonus year out of center Elijah Malone would be a decent start to add to the five freshmen joining the program later this year. But even within that quintet, some of those pieces project more as bench parts than front-liners on a truly competitive Big 12 team. Assuming the transfer portal is in play, Boyle has to add backcourt skill and experience, along with frontcourt brawn. The priority doesn’t matter. The Buffs need both.

During the rock-bottom portion of the schedule, Boyle often used his postgame press conferences to take the blame for this year’s roster construction. The coming weeks offer an opportunity to right that wrong.