“It didn’t work out so well for us last week,” Boss said of the Spartans’ 11-10 loss in Kalamazoo.

“It’s a busy week, and I think Western hopefully opened our eyes a little bit last week. We’re definitely ready to go out and compete.”

Wednesday’s loss was one of four straight for the Spartans (23-9 overall, 5-4 Big Ten) before beating Ohio State 14-7 on Sunday. The Broncos sent 10 batters to the plate in a six-run first inning, and freshman pitcher Andrew Waszak was chased after allowing eight hits and seven runs in one and one-third innings.

“College baseball, anybody can win on a given day,” senior outfielder Eli Boike said. “I think we weren’t 100 percent focused (against Western Michigan last week). Maybe we were looking a little too far ahead into the Ohio State series. We didn’t execute and that was one of the main problems.”

In contrast, Western Michigan’s win was its second in a four-game winning streak that included taking two out of three against Miami (Ohio) this weekend. The Broncos (9-24, 3-8 MAC) moved out of the overall last-place spot in the MAC but still are at the bottom of the West Division.

“To say we underestimated them I think does a disservice to their program,” Boss said. “I think it was one of those things where maybe we thought we were a little better than we were. Again, nothing to do with Western, but I thought maybe we were getting to the point where we thought we could just step out onto the field and we were going to win.

“You want some of that, but our guys need to understand they need to put forth the effort to play well in order to win. (Western’s) got scholarship guys, too.”

Boss said the Spartans could learn a thing or two from the Buckeyes, who came into East Lansing tied with MSU for first in the Big Ten. As it stands at the end of the weekend, the Spartans are in a four-way tie for second with Purdue, Indiana and Northwestern.

“I told (MSU) after Friday’s game, if you’re going to be the best, you have to beat the best,” Boss said. “You watch what Ohio State does — they come in, they’re confident, they have a swagger but they’re not arrogant and they go about their business. When guys make great plays, you don’t see a lot of hoopla, because that’s what they expect to do. We have to get to that point.”

The Spartans maintain the conference’s second-best batting average (.332) behind the Buckeyes and now have the third-best ERA (4.88).

Their on-base percentage (.413) and stolen bases attempts (87) are tops in the conference, as well.

On the other hand, the Spartans have allowed the most hits (290), runs (162) and walks (85) among Big Ten teams.

But before the Spartans see three more good conference arms, they’ll see back-to-back MAC talent in the Broncos and Central Michigan on Wednesday at Dow Diamond in Midland.

“We’re going out there to win every game we play,” Boike said. “If you want to get an at-large bid in the NCAA Tournament, you’ve got to win 40 games. That’s kind of our goal. We don’t want to lose any in-state games. We want to be on top of the state of Michigan.”