Shaka Smart was sitting in the interview room at Fiserv Forum on Wednesday night, the head coach trying to make sense of the latest vexing loss by the 11^th-ranked Marquette men’s basketball team.

About 50 feet away from Smart was the visiting team’s locker room, and the strains of jubilant music could still be heard coming from Butler celebrating its shocking 69-62 victory.

BOX SCORE: Butler 69, Marquette 62

It was a striking scene.

The Golden Eagles (11-5, 2-3 Big East) hadn’t lost to a Big East opponent at home since Jan. 1, 2022, in Smart’s first season. That 20-game winning streak tied a league mark, and the Bulldogs (11-5, 2-3) made sure MU didn’t grab the record for itself.

But there are bigger problems for the Golden Eagles. The once high-flying offense has been mired in a deep funk, and injuries have sapped the team’s depth.

A season that began with a top-five ranking and talk of the Final Four seems to be teetering five games into the conference season. MU already has as many losses to Big East foes as it did during last season’s 17-3 march to the regular-season conference title.

“We have to step forward,” Smart said. “I think what’s even more important is our guys have done such a good job, really, over the past two years of supporting one another and playing for one another.

“Truly losing themselves in the fight together for a common goal for Marquette. That wasn’t us tonight. And that’s what’s really, really disappointing. So we’re going to have to figure out how to get back to that because it’s there. It’s the same guys. But that was elusive tonight.”

Kam Jones, Tyler Kolek can’t get three-point shots to fall

Kam Jones started out attacking the basket, making six of his first seven shots, and it looked like the MU junior guard was going to break out of a shooting slump that has plagued Jones over the start to Big East play.

Then Jones and his teammates starting bombing away three-point attempts, with most of them meeting the same fate by bouncing hard off the iron.

MU finished an unsightly 5 for 31 (16.1%) from beyond the arc.

“Yeah, it’s mental,” Smart said. “Kam hit nine threes in live play yesterday in practice. On just as hard, if not harder, shots.

“Right now I think we have to figure out how to free these guys’ minds in the game. Because for whatever reason, there’s something taking them out of the present moment.

“We’re shooting with avoidance, and obviously it’s a big domino right now because I thought we got really tentative on offense at times because guys didn’t know if they would be able to shoot it in just because of the way we were shooting the ball. Then Butler sensed that, and any time you get more tentative, the other team gets more aggressive.”

Jones was 1 for 10 from deep against Butler, making him 8 for 42 (19%) in five Big East games.

Most concerning for MU fans is the play of reigning Big East player of the year Tyler Kolek.

The preseason first-team All-American shot 1 for 13, missing all seven of his three-point attempts. He did hand out eight assists, but he is shooting 2 for 19 in MU’s back-to-back losses to Seton Hall and Butler.

“The biggest thing he needs to do, and we need to do, and I need to help him with, is understanding that certain things are not going to be made easy for you,” Smart said. “And when times get hard and things get hard – I mean, he had eight assists tonight and he probably felt a level of frustration because there’s 8 to 10 to 12 to 20 more where he made the right play and we just didn’t make the shot.

“Well, that’s how the game was going. He and we allowed those circumstances to take us out of who we needed to be. And so it’s getting back to here’s who I am when I’m at my best, this is who we are when we’re at our best, and trusting in that.

“There wasn’t enough trust tonight across the board in our work, our preparation. Guys had two phenomenal practices. Very, very good practices. Shot the ball well. And, for whatever reason, it felt like there was an uneasiness there and a lack of trust.”

Injuries to Sean Jones and Chase Ross have depleted bench

The Golden Eagles led by 11 points in the first half and seven at halftime. But a five-minute scoring drought and an 11-0 run gave Butler control early in the second half.

MU trailed, 59-49, and was trying to find a late spark when backup point guard Sean Jones stole the ball with just under five minutes remaining and sprinted toward the basket.

But the 5-foot-10 sparkplug’s right knee gave out and Jones writhed on the court in pain. He was carried back to the team’s locker room.

“Don’t have anything official, but it looks like Sean sustained a knee injury,” Smart said. “We will get a MRI and get official results tomorrow.

“So right now we’re trying to be there for him and help him understand that, regardless of the results, there’s a pathway forward.”

MU’s depth had already taken a blow in the loss at Seton Hall when sixth man Chase Ross suffered a left shoulder injury.

Ross will miss at least a few games. The team announced on Wednesday that he will be re-evaluated later this month.

Shaka Smart trying to stop Golden Eagles' spiral

In early December, the Golden Eagles were the No. 3 team in the country. At the Maui Invitational in Honolulu, they beat top-ranked Kansas and battled then-No. 2 Purdue to the wire in a close loss.

Just over a month later, with adversity hitting MU at all angles, Smart is trying to keep the team from spiraling further.

“The first thing is understanding it’s a long season,” Smart said. “And we’ve played a quarter of our Big East games. And we’ve not played as well as we want to play.

“Obviously, we’ve not gotten the results we want to get through five games in the Big East. And at the same time, it’s on us and no one else to respond.”

The Golden Eagles entered this season with Final Four hopes. Perhaps the pressure of those expectations has negatively affected the players who have been through many battles together.

“I don’t think it’s exactly that,” Smart said. “Expectations, more internally than anything else, lead to some frustration if you don’t achieve those expectations because there’s a gap.

“There’s a gap between what you think you quote-unquote should happen. You’ve heard me say ‘should’ is the most dangerous word in sports. And then there’s what happened. And so tonight is a good example of that.

“You don’t win a game in the Big East because you should. You win a game in the Big East because you get enough team stops and team scores to outplay the other team. I think it’s certainly a different season from the standpoint of our guys’ lived experience.

“I think right now, for sure, our competitive maturity and understanding of how to handle who we are and where we are, needs to catch up with the lived experience that our guys have had. And, ultimately, it’s my job to help them with that and we’re excited about doing that moving forward."

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Marquette loses to Butler 69-62 at Fiserv Forum