At times in the second half, the Spartans looked like they wanted to get beat, hanging their heads and playing down to Harvard’s level.

But they were resilient, as they have been all season.

When things got tough and it looked like the Spartans were down and out, suddenly they weren’t.

Head coach Tom Izzo said after the game, as he's said many times this season, that this team will never be what they could have been.

No doubt this isn’t the team that beat Kentucky and slaughtered the majority of their pre-Big Ten schedule.

That team didn’t need to have the cojones to squeak out a win or hold off a team, they simply blew them out, other than the North Carolina game in which Branden Dawson didn’t have his best game.

But the Spartans showed something against Harvard that they haven’t since back then.

A will to win.

There was no way Adreian Payne was going to back up his historic 41 point performance from the last time the Spartans hit the hardwood, but Dawson was the next in line — at least in the first half.

A few times this season, the Spartans have lost a lead, and when Dawson was sidelined with a broken hand, many times they couldn’t come back.

In the Big Ten tournament, when both Wisconsin and Northwestern made small runs and Dawson was back, they held off their opponents to capture the crown.

Tonight, with Branden Dawson silent for much of the second half and Harvard making an even bigger run with the majority of Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena behind them, it was Gary Harris and Travis Trice who were clutch and powered the Spartans to victory.

It wasn’t one person who got the Spartans over the hump, but a collective team effort.

If Izzo could have his way, he’d take five and six point wins from here on out.

The pressure to win, the opponents or the bright lights of New York City won’t distract this team — they’ve been through more than any other team in the nation.

Harvard had Spartan Nation as a whole shaking in their boots tonight, but that’s a good thing because the road ahead is just as dangerous.

This win wasn’t the prettiest, but it’s going to help them days — and possibly weeks — from today.

Zach Smith is a men's basketball reporter at The State News. Reach him at zsmith@statenews.com.