The former guard and member of the 2000 national championship team stopped by practice to meet with several players a day after the team fell to the Hurricanes in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge. His message? Play harder. Build on positives. And above all, realize potential.

“The players had a little meeting, a little film session and he met with a couple of guys just to let them know it wasn’t acceptable on how we played,” head coach Tom Izzo said on Friday. “I wasn’t in the meeting, but I (bet) it was a good meeting.”

It was a message that many Spartans took to heart, which showed up in the team’s 84-39 trouncing of Nicholls State on Saturday at Breslin Center. The Spartans shot 60 percent from the floor and had four players in double-figures, while cutting down turnovers to just eight in the game.

The improved effort was one that was noticed by Izzo and his many of his players after the game.

“We needed a game like this,” he said. “We needed a game where we shot it pretty well, 60 percent, shot pretty well from the three, we didn’t take very many of them. It was hard to rebound, we were only up a couple of them at halftime, but when they [Nicholls State] had 15 turnovers, there weren’t a lot of rebounds to get.”

Cleaves reportedly met with several of the team’s guards, including junior Keith Appling, sophomores Branden Dawson and Travis Trice and freshmen Gary Harris and Denzel Valentine. With an NCAA title and various accolades to his credit, Cleaves offers the perspective of leadership with a résumé easily respected by members of the Spartans.

Dawson said seeing the respect former players have for the program fuels a different and more competitive mindset on the court for the current team, which showed up in the game against Nicholls State.

“When Mateen came down here, it kind of made a lot of guys think differently about the program and Coach Iz (said), guys just need need to respect the program more,” Dawson said. “Those guys put a lot in, they put everything and their all into it. … Those guys, Charlie Bell (who was in attendance Saturday), come back and support us and that’s a big thing.”

For Appling, who has called Cleaves his most significant inspiration at the point guard position, hearing the critique of somebody who cares about the program the way Cleaves does is received positively in the locker room, as well it should be.

“Mateen is Mateen,” Appling said on Friday. “He’s a very energetic guy and is always into it. He thought there was some things he would share with us and he came up here and shared them. He’s pretty into it. … You just gotta try to build on the good things we did and improve on the bad things that happened.”

The Spartans get back to action at 8 p.m. on Wednesday at Breslin Center against Arkansas-Pine Bluff.