But four seconds into Tuesday night’s tilt with Northwood (Fla.), the sophomore guard already had thrown down a two-handed jam — one of three highlight reel dunks on the night — along with the team’s first six points, leaving Dawson with one word to describe his recovery, now three months ahead of schedule: “blessed.”

Dawson scored a team-high 16 points along with seven rebounds, to help the Spartans blow out Northwood 85-57 Tuesday at Breslin Center to kick off the basketball season.

Despite the large margin of victory, head coach Tom Izzo said he was disappointed with the way his team played, particularly not getting out and running in the open floor as much as they had in the previous three weeks of practice.

“I think (senior center Derrick) Nix said it best, to use a phrase from Bill Parcells, ‘we didn’t do our job,’” Izzo said. “We didn’t run, we didn’t do the things that we’ve been doing in practice and doing a great job of … and that was disappointing.”

After building a small early lead, the Spartans turned to their bench and saw Northwood surge with a 10-2 run to take their largest lead of the game 16-12.

Freshman guard Denzel Valentine ended the Seahawks’ rally with a no-look pass to set up a layup for sophomore forward Alex Gauna, igniting a 18-3 run that helped MSU take the lead for good and head into halftime in front 34-28.

Gauna finished with 10 points off the bench and was one of five Spartans to score in double figures.

Izzo said the desire to push the ball up the floor begins with Keith Appling, and the junior guard said because of that, it’s his responsibility to make sure he and his teammates are executing at the level expected.

“We didn’t run half as much as we ran in practice or that we planned to but that’s one of the things that we (have) to fix,” Appling said. “I feel like all of it falls on me because I’m the one who wants to run and I should be motivating everybody else to run.”

But after playing what Rollie Massimino described as a “pretty good half,” the Northwood head coach said MSU’s depth and athleticism wore out the Seahawks in the second half, as the Spartans opened the second half on a 14-3 run that put the game out of reach.

Freshman guard Gary Harris led the early push and finished with 14 points, with sophomore guard Travis Trice tacking on 12 points, four rebounds and four assists.

Still, Nix said the team’s performance was only, “decent,” and that it’s important for the Spartans to use Tuesday’s exhibition along with the final preseason tilt Friday to find out who they are as a team.

“We practice way, way harder than we played, and I’m not going to throw us under the bus but, like I said, we looked sloppy at times,” said Nix, who finished with 13 points and a team-high eight rebounds.

“We’ve still got to know our roles on this team and I feel like we all know our roles, so as long as we keep playing together it’ll just keep building.”