After enjoying arguably the most successful five-year run in Florida State men's basketball history, Leonard Hamilton and his coaching staff find themselves in an extremely challenging situation.

On the one hand, they want to be positive and encouraging to a young team that has had some good moments but also struggles with wild inconsistency. On the other, they want to make sure the entire 2021-22 squad understands the standard they're being asked to uphold.

"There's positive pressure, and then there's negative pressure," Hamilton said Tuesday morning, less than 48 hours after the Seminoles blew an early 16-point lead and eventually fell by one point Sunday to South Carolina. "I think they need to be encouraged and feel good about the progress we're making. But I also think there needs to be a little pride that they take from being able to represent a program that has had a certain level of success.

"They're standing on some pretty broad shoulders -- of guys who have set a standard by which we all are judged."

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It will take a pretty stunning turnaround at this point to approach anything close to that standard.

Depending on what happens Wednesday against visiting Lipscomb (9 p.m. ET, ACC Network), the Seminoles will finish their first 10 games with a record of either 6-4 or 5-5.

Whichever way that game goes, it will be FSU's worst mark at this point of the season since 2014-15 -- the last time Hamilton's program didn't make the postseason.

Since that year, right before the talented freshman class of Dwayne Bacon, Malik Beasley, Terance Mann and Christ Koumadje arrived, FSU has started the past six seasons either 9-1 or 8-2. The Seminoles have done each three times.

Not coincidentally, they have been one of the best programs in the country over that span.

This year's squad, which is relying on a retooled roster that has four first-year players among the top seven scorers, has lost three straight games and recently fell to an ACC opponent at home for the first time in three years.

At the same time, it's not as if these 'Noles have been outclassed by the competition, other than in road losses to Purdue and Florida. In their other two losses, they actually had large leads in the first half -- 16 against South Carolina and 11 against Syracuse.

"We obviously are playing well enough in the first half to have the lead. But we're not sustaining for the whole 40 minutes," Hamilton said. "The encouraging thing is we've been pretty good in the first half. We don't lose our abilities at halftime."

What they might be losing is composure and confidence. And Hamilton thinks it's a combination of young players not yet grasping how to play to their strengths and minimize their weaknesses, and older players still not comfortable with the transition from supporting roles to leading men.

Newcomers like Caleb Mills and Matthew Cleveland have had great moments -- they rank first and third on the team in scoring at 12.7 and 9.2 points per game -- but they also have forced things in inopportune times.

Veterans Anthony Polite and Wyatt Wilkes have been very good spot-up shooters in the past, but they're not getting as many quality looks because the rest of the offense is not operating as efficiently. They also have been guilty of forcing things on occasion.

"There's no question that there's a lot of apprehensiveness," Hamilton said. "There's a lot of indecision. You see 'em thinking. You don't see the expressions on their faces that are extremely confident, like you've seen us in the past.

"But that's the adjustment we as a staff have to make, because I don't know if we've ever had a situation where we've started two or three freshmen ... this is just a learning position that a lot of these guys are in."

Of course, it hasn't helped that starting center Tanor Ngom has been out with a knee injury that could keep him sidelined for another month. Kentucky transfer Cam'Ron Fletcher and senior guard RayQuan Evans also have missed time during these recent struggles; after the team opened with a 5-1 start.

So Hamilton doesn't necessarily feel like he and his staff have to make any major changes to their approach. He intends to keep doing what has put the program in position to make multiple runs to the Sweet 16 and even the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament.

"I feel confident that our system has been consistently successful enough that I'm not sure we need to tweak it," he said. "I just think that we need to have time to continue to keep growing and improving."

And not letting outside influences become a distraction.

After entering the season predicted to finish second in the ACC, behind only Duke, Hamilton acknowledged there is plenty of negativity on social media about his team's performance so far.

While he wants the players to embrace the expectations and standards within the program, he thinks it's important that they keep the outside voices in check.

"You have to avoid letting yourself get caught up in being evaluated by people who are not in the trenches with you," Hamilton said. "But these are nothing but learning opportunities and growth opportunities for our team. The true test of your character is how you respond to adversity."

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