The Michigan State women’s basketball team mounted a heroic late game comeback to force overtime and again fought back in the extra period for a chance to avoid a bad home loss. The attempt came up just short as MSU suffered an 84-80 loss to Wisconsin in the program's inaugural Pride night on Wednesday night.

With the loss, the Spartans fall to 10-7 overall and 2-4 in Big Ten play, while Wisconsin improves to 2-4 in league play and 6-11 overall.

Moira Joiner led Michigan State in scoring with 20 points, a career-high that bested Saturday's 19 at Maryland (Spartans Illustrated spoke with Joiner following that loss). Joiner shot 4-of-6 from 3-point range and made a season high seven field goals overall while leading the team with three steals. DeeDee Hagemann was second on the team in scoring with 17 points, and notched a team-high seven assists, while also matching Joiner's three steals.

Matilda Ekh added 14 points, shooting just 2-of-9 from 3-point range. Kamar McDaniel added 11 points, and Taiyier Parks notched a double-double with 11 points and a team-high 10 rebounds to round out the Spartans in double figures for scoring. Julia Ayrault also led the Spartans with two blocks.

Wisconsin's Serah Williams led all scorers with 31 points and also grabbed 13 rebounds (both a career-high for the freshman forward) for a double-double on the night before fouling out. Williams set eight different statistical career-highs against the Spartans overall. Maty Wilke scored 16 and Brook Schramek added 12 points for the Badgers scoring in double figures.

Michigan State only led once on the night -- late in the fourth quarter late -- but kept the game close early in the first. Wisconsin never led by more than five points during the opening stanza and the Spartans managed to tie it up three times. At the end of the first, the Badgers narrowly led 16-13.

The second quarter saw Wisconsin start to assert control as MSU struggled to gain traction offensively. The Spartans scored just 12 points in the period, and the Badgers pushed the lead out to nine points twice in the final minutes. McDaniel managed to cut Wisconsin's lead to 32-25 with a buzzer beating layup to end the first half.

The Spartans were finally able to find a rhythm on offense in the third quarter, though Wisconsin still outscored MSU 17-16 in the period. After Ekh sunk two free throws in the opening moments, the Badgers used an 8-2 run to open up the lead at 40-29. Michigan State quickly cut it back to single-digits and prevented Wisconsin from running away with it. By the final buzzer of the third stanza, MSU trailed just 49-41.

Wisconsin again used an early push in the final period of regulation to extend its lead back out to double-digits, taking a 59-47 lead with 7:43 remaining. Michigan State used an 11-4 run capped off by a 3-pointer from Ekh to cut the deficit back to five, trailing just 63-58 with 5:03 left.

The Spartans continued to fight back, and with just 23 seconds left, took a narrow 70-68 lead for the first and only time of the night. A breakdown on the defensive end on the ensuing Wisconsin possession let Williams tie it up on a wide open layup underneath the basket, forcing overtime after both teams proceeded to turn it over on the final two possessions following Williams' layup.

Wisconsin yet again found success in the opening minutes of overtime like in the preceding quarters of regulation. The Badgers built up a four-point lead three separate times before Michigan State was able to cut it to within one, trailing 78-77 with just 1:03 remaining in the extra period.

A second-chance score by Williams with 22 seconds remaining in overtime and a missed layup by Joiner on the offensive end forced the Spartans to resort to fouling Wisconsin down the final stretch.

Slivers of hope did show for MSU when the Badgers' Williams committed a shooting foul of her own -- her fifth of the game -- against Hagemann on a 3-point attempt. She hit all three free throws and that cut the lead back to 82-80 Wisconsin with eight seconds remaining. Then the other chances came when the Badgers missed twice on the back end of two separate sets of free-throw attempts in the finals seconds, which kept the score within striking distance, but Michigan State couldn't find the offense.

The Spartans return to action on Saturday when the team travels to Ann Arbor to take on archrival No. 17/20 Michigan. Tipoff is scheduled for 2 p.m. Eastern Time and the game will be streamed on B1G+.