Coming off of back-to-back losses and falling to 4-3 in the Big Ten, optimism likely isn’t a characteristic shared by Spartan fans, but the players and coaches know things are moving in the right direction, something Roe emphasized to the few traveling media members after the game.

“You’ve got to be surprised, but at the same time, we’re so close, it’s ridiculous,” Roe said of the team’s struggles. “We’re right there. We might not win the Big Ten, but I tell you what, at the end of the year, we’re going to be right there. Teams are going to be afraid to play us come March.”

For a team coming off back-to-back Final Fours and a preseason No. 2 ranking, “getting better” at this point in the season isn’t acceptable to many people. But what this team should have done is irrelevant to what the team is doing at this point. And what the team is doing is in fact getting better.

Purdue shot 58 percent on Saturday, but aside from a few Lewis Jackson layups and open 3-pointers from E’Twaun Moore, the Spartans played well on defense. Roe played Purdue forward JaJuan Johnson about as well as you possibly can and Johnson still put up 20 points. Izzo said he didn’t have a complaint about senior guard Durrell Summers’ second-half defense for the first time in his career.

If you take away senior guard Kalin Lucas’ uncharacteristic 3-for-16 shooting performance, MSU shot 53 percent from the field and only turned the ball over 11 times as a team. Purdue simply couldn’t miss.

Expecting wins at Illinois or Purdue is lofty, but you could argue MSU has played better in these last two losses than the two overtime wins the previous week. In all honesty, MSU should be 2-5 in conference play. Wisconsin doesn’t blow leads like they did against MSU and an offensive board by Green saved the game against Northwestern.

“When the season started, and you put your wins and losses down, I’m one off probably right now,” men’s basketball head coach Tom Izzo said. “Did anybody here think you were going to beat Purdue at Purdue or Illinois at Illinois? You hope you can. The Penn State loss was a critical loss for us.”

MSU’s hopes for a Big Ten title are closer to none than slim. But that doesn’t mean the season is lost.

Of MSU’s six Final Four appearances in the last 12 seasons, the Spartans won the Big Ten regular-season title in five of those years. The one year MSU made the Final Four without a Big Ten championship was 2005, with a team which underachieved all season before making a surprising run to St. Louis for the Final Four — a team eerily similar to this season’s Spartans.

The Spartans are getting better but playing extremely talented opponents on their home floor doesn’t provide an opportunity to gain confidence. The upcoming schedule does.

Four of MSU’s next five games are against the bottom four teams in the Big Ten. Sandwiched in there is a road game at Wisconsin. MSU must win at least four of those games. If the Spartans continue to improve their play, they’ll have some momentum for the first time all year heading down the closing stretch.

Individual players have found their roles. Roe and freshman guard Keith Appling are two of the league’s best defenders. Lucas has most of his speed back. Junior forward Draymond Green can do everything for the Spartans and other players have their roles. Now the Spartans just need to put those roles together.

“Everybody’s frustrated, we don’t like losing,” Roe said. “We don’t lose here. We didn’t lose our whole careers growing up. But it’s a learning experience. We know we’re right there. It’s not like we’re getting blown out 20 points games and just getting outplayed. We’re in every game. We’re down to the wire everywhere.

“Like I said before, we’re going to get this thing turned around quick.”

Chris Vannini is a State News sports reporter. He can be reached at vanninic@msu.edu.