When the Terrapins men’s basketball team’s inaugural Big Ten schedule was released in late August, I keyed in on a number of entertaining matchups.

Conference opener at Michigan State in front of the Izzone? My mouth started to water. Late January matchup with Indiana at historic Assembly Hall? Shivers ran down my spine. Playing host to a national-title-contending Wisconsin team in February?

You get the picture.

But never in a hundred years would I have put any emphasis on tonight’s home contest against Penn State.

Traveling to State College for a game at Beaver Stadium is one thing. Facing a program that hasn’t finished above .500 since 2011 is a much less exciting proposition, especially when it occurs within the familiar confines of Xfinity Center.

Yet with the No. 17 Terps ailing from the worst three-game stretch of the season, tonight’s matchup with the Nittany Lions is perhaps the most important test to date for coach Mark Turgeon’s young squad.

Not so much because of whom the Terps are playing, but because of what a loss — or another shaky victory, for that matter — could mean.

Thanks to the past two weeks, which featured blowout losses at Indiana and Ohio State and the closest of close calls at home against Northwestern, the Terps have dropped from the top 15 in the AP poll and now sit at their lowest ranking since Dec. 15. Once a No. 2 seed in Joe Lunardi’s projected NCAA tournament bracket on ESPN.com, the Terps have fallen to a projected No. 4 seed behind their recent string of play.

Granted, these are all college basketball first-world problems for fans who’ve supported the Terps for the past five years. But there’s no denying this team is on a downward trend, and it hasn’t shown any signs of correcting itself since the Hoosiers hit 15 of 22 threes and shot the Terps out of the gym in Bloomington on Jan. 22.

That’s why tonight is so important; it provides a chance for Turgeon’s group to regain some confidence against an inferior opponent and put on the type of performance everyone expected when the Terps faced off against the last-place Wildcats.

Based on the past three games, though, the problems in need of fixing are widespread.

It starts on defense, which not long ago was a daunting unit for Turgeon’s squad. Before this recent stint, the Terps surrendered 67 points just three times. They’ve now done it in three consecutive games.

A big reason for the downturn has been the Terps’ perimeter defense, which allowed the Hoosiers, Wildcats and Buckeyes to shoot a combined 56 percent from three-point land over the past three games. But perhaps lost in that statistic is the fact that the Terps have been without a legitimate post presence, too.

After having appeared to make significant strides early in his sophomore season, forward Damonte Dodd has regressed of late. The big man hasn’t played more than 12 minutes in any of the past three games and has just one blocked shot since Jan. 17.

Offensively, the Terps have experienced a dip in production from their primary scoring trio: Dez Wells, Jake Layman and Melo Trimble. In the past three games, Wells (12.7), Layman (10.3) and Trimble (13.3) have all posted scoring averages below their season marks. And Trimble, a freshman, had the worst showing of his career in the Terps’ most recent bout, totaling three points on 0 of 8 shooting in a loss to the Buckeyes.

Then senior Richaud Pack, a significant contributor on both ends of the floor during non-conference play and the early stages of the Big Ten schedule, appears to have a less pronounced role. In his past five games, the graduate transfer is averaging just 3.6 points on 5 of 14 shooting. Pack went 10 of 14 from the field for 22 points in a single game earlier this season, a win over VMI.

All these issues are reason for concern. But tonight’s matchup with the Nittany Lions is a golden opportunity for the Terps to show signs of improvement and get a convincing win under their belt.

Before this stretch, though, this game might have been an afterthought.