PISCATAWAY -- At the end of his in-person interview to be the next Rutgers football coach, Chris Ash was handed a copy of the 2016 schedule.

Athletics director Pat Hobbs wanted to gauge his top candidate's reaction to facing so many of the top teams in the nation, especially in the first half of his first season.

"He said, 'Yep, that's why you do this,'" Hobbs said. "You love to hear that answer."

Ten months later, the schedule hasn't disappointed, but it's left outspoken fans with unrealistically high expectations feeling discouraged as Rutgers prepares for its third game against a Top 5-ranked opponent within the first six weeks of the season.

"Any program that plays three top-five schools in the first six weeks, that's a challenging schedule," Ash said. "I don't know if there's a lot of coaches out there that would say, 'Hey, I'd like to sign up for that. Let's put that together.'"

There's a difference between choosing a challenge and welcoming one, however.

Rutgers is looking at its game against No. 4 Michigan at 7 p.m. Saturday night as another opportunity to make a statement. The Scarlet Knights lost to No. 5 (then-No. 14) Washington, 48-13, in the opener and to No. 2 Ohio State, 58-0, last week.

"Maybe this is just my opinion, but the best way to learn is to get thrown in the fire," defensive tackle Darius Hamilton said. "I know when I came into college that's the only way I wanted to learn.

"People talk about mental reps and things like that, but I wanted to be out there. I wanted things to happen. I don't think there's any better way to learn what you are up against then to go out there and play them."

No other team in the nation will have faced even two of the current Top 5 teams (Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Michigan and Washington) by week's end.

The closest comparisons are:

Oklahoma faced No. 6 (then-No. 15) Houston and No. 2 (then-No. 3) Ohio State

Wisconsin faced unranked (then-No. 5) LSU and No. 4 Michigan as well as unranked (then-No. 8) Michigan State

Louisville faced No. 23 (then-No. 2) Florida State and No. 3 (then-No. 5) Clemson.

The glaring difference is that all three of those teams are ranked among the Top 20 themselves whereas Rutgers is undertaking a rebuild under Ash after last season's 4-8 finish and years of subpar recruiting under former coach Kyle Flood.

"I think that (schedule) is perfect," defensive end Julian Pinnix-Odrick said. "You want to play the best of the best. For people who aren't in our position right now, it can seem overwhelming. That's cool, but that's not us. Especially as a fifth-year, send the world at (us), and I think it's my job to help lead the younger guys into battle."

Rutgers began the season with the No. 33 most-difficult schedule in the nation based on opponents' winning percentage from last season, according to PhilSteele.com.

Because the slate is front-loaded -- Rutgers also faced unranked (preseason No. 17 Iowa) -- the current strength of schedule ranks No. 18 nationally.

The Scarlet Knights do not face a ranked team the rest of the way, though Michigan State and Indiana both are receiving votes in the Associated Press Top 25 poll.

"We want to play the best talent in the country, and we have," right guard Chris Muller said. "The results haven't gone the way we wanted and we're not in it for moral victories, but we just have to keep improving and keep working on our fundamentals."

A sports cliche says that you learn more from a loss than from a win. Does that still apply to a blowout loss?

"In both those games there were a lot of missed opportunities," Muller said, "and we didn't play football to the ability that everyone on the team knows we can."

What separates the players from the fans is that the team can't let a 58-0 loss carry over to the next week. Or it risks suffering a repeat performance.

"It's definitely depressing. Nobody wants to get beat bad at all because you know the work that we put in," halfback Robert Martin said. "Every loss hurts. If it comes by 60 points or 10-15 points, you are still going to grow from it. You just can't let that affect you at the end of the day."

For the optimist, Rutgers will come out of the first half of the schedule knowing exactly how much ground it needs to gain on elite competition.

"It's a great measuring stick for where we're at, and it gives our players a really good indication of what we have to do to try to continue to close that gap," Ash said. "If you don't play them and you don't really get to see them first-hand, you're not really sure how big that gap is and what you have to do to close it."

It's also a decent testing ground for what will and will not work from a play-calling standpoint.

"I think it's given us a very good barometer of how we match up and what we can and cannot do well," offensive coordinator Drew Mehringer said. "Going into the second half of the season where there is not three Top 5 teams, I think our kids will know exactly what we are going to call and execute and feel great about that."

Schedules are set years in advance -- the Big Ten league slates are in place through 2019 -- and the Washington game was added in March 2014 when the Huskies were coming off a 9-4 season and Flood rejected a proposal to play Syracuse.

"It is what it is," Pinnix-Odrick said. "You can't hide from it. I wouldn't want anything more than to be playing three Top 5 teams."

LISTEN: Episode 4 of NJ.com's Rutgers Football podcast

Rebuilding Rutgers: From The Ashes takes you inside the new football regime. This episode is about Jim Harbaugh invading N.J. and Chris Ash fighting back.

Ryan Dunleavy may be reached at rdunleavy@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @rydunleavy. Find NJ.com Rutgers Football on Facebook.