Tuesday’s game against Indiana was supposed to be the calm before the storm. Tom Izzo would break Bob Knight’s Big Ten wins record and No. 11 Michigan State would be able to turn their attention to dealing with the upcoming gauntlet of a schedule.

Instead, MSU was stumped by IU's zone defense and dropped what was probably its easiest (at least on paper) regular season game left. Izzo remains tied with Knight at 353 conference wins, and the treacherous final stretch has arrived, starting with a big road game Saturday night against Illinois on Fox.

“After looking at the film — I took responsibility that night (against Indiana) — I take more responsibility (today),” Izzo said Thursday after practice. “(Indiana) played 4% zone (defense) the whole year, they played 90% after we went up 20-8, they adjusted."

Izzo blamed himself.

“We adjusted, but we didn’t adjust good enough, and that falls on me," he said. "And I’m the first, at least behind the scenes, to blame a player for something if they didn’t do it, but I also think my job is to put players in a position to be successful - and we fell a little short on that.”

As for how Izzo and his team might look against a zone defense going forward, the coaching staff has certainly seemed to have addressed it.

“Am I worried about zone?” Izzo said. “I hope we get zoned for 40 minutes on Saturday. How’s that? That’s how worried I am.”

While the Fighting Illini are currently unranked, that label is very deceiving. There is a reason the Illini took MSU to the brink in an 80-78 game just under a month ago. The NCAA’s NET rankings, something the tournament selection committee takes into account, currently puts Illinois at No. 12 nationally; that’s second only to Purdue in the Big Ten.

“That’s a great team,” said forward Coen Carr. “We know we’ve got to come ready to play. We’ve got to come with our Ps and Qs against them, for sure.”

It’s going to be a dramatic change in atmosphere from Tuesday’s game.

MSU will go from an arena packed full of fans with a desire to see history to another packed full of people who would much rather see Izzo’s 354th conference win happen elsewhere.

“It’s loud (there),” said guard Jeremy Fears Jr., an Illinois native and a former recruit of Illini head coach Brad Underwood. “Obviously, they go on a run and (the students and fans) get loud and it brings them energy and brings them life. So our job is — obviously, you probably have got to try and control the crowd — so (we have to) make sure we don’t give up any huge runs or leads or big plays, but still making sure we’re smart and doing everything we need to do to control that and control us.”

Really, going on the road and getting away from all the distractions about Izzo’s record could have some benefits. Izzo insists he isn’t worried at all about it - and that he doesn’t think his players are too concerned either - but it is the type of thing that will constantly hover over everyone’s head until the Izzo's magic number is reached.