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12/18/2000 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 18, 2000
By Jay Reddick
Craig Dawson knew that salad days like this would come for him. He just didn't know when.
The 6-foot-5 junior has never come close to averaging 16.1 points a game as a collegian, as he was during the Deacon basketball team's exam break. He never led the team in scoring for three straight games, like he did earlier this season. And he certainly never had a field-goal percentage among the top 15 in the ACC, as he did after the first seven games of this year.
Dawson's always been a valuable player for the Deacs. In the first semester of the 2000-01 season, though, he just might have been the MVP.
What caused this sudden surge? Dawson said nothing more complicated than good health allowed him to show what he can do.
"When I had the stress fracture (in my left leg) my freshman year, that slowed me down a lot," Dawson said. "I still wasn't 100 percent last year, and it was difficult for me to move laterally. This year, I'm getting open, and my health helps that a lot. I don't hurt anymore. And the confidence is big too."
You wouldn't think confidence would be a problem for Craig Dawson. This is the player who, as a high school senior, told Gold Rush "I have good range. I'm comfortable shooting it up from just about anywhere." And to be sure, any lack of confidence hasn't kept him from shooting, Dawson could be fourth on the Deacons' all-time list for 3-point field goals by the end of January.
The difference in Dawson this season is this: when he misses a shot, he won't let his tears rust his trigger for the next one.
"I don't spend any time worrying about the last play anymore," Dawson said. "My teammates keep telling me to shoot the ball when I'm open, and they've done a great job getting me in position to take them. Beyond that, I'm just doing what I always did. I expected to play well, but I certainly didn't anticipate leading the team in scoring."
Dawson's confidence is spreading. The Deacons rose to 7-0 after a whitewash of No. 3 Kansas, and were rated No. 6 in the Associated Press media poll on Dec. 11.
When you add in five wins for the NIT championship at the end of last season, Wake Forest is on the verge of its longest winning streak under coach Dave Odom. Dawson's been a big part of that from his sixth-man role, but he's only one piece of the puzzle.
"The mindset of everyone on the team has been key all year," Dawson said. "We all have a positive attitude. The way we finished last year gave us a lot of confidence. We've learned to pull together and not worry about each others' individual stats."
The team played a couple of close games early in the year, beating Richmond by eight and Michigan and South Carolina State by 11. All signs pointed to the Jayhawks being the toughest opponent so far, but it didn't turn out that way.
"We didn't anticipate that at all," Dawson said of the 84-53 blowout. "We thought it would go down to the wire. But when we took the lead, we just got it in our minds to take this game. We had a great home crowd behind us, and we just took it to them."
Dawson scored 20 points that night, his third such effort after never getting that 20th point before this season. But the thing observers took away from that game was how well the team played together. Dawson said having seven juniors or seniors in the eight-man rotation was a factor there.
"We've got better team chemistry, that's for sure," Dawson said. "That comes with maturity. Teams are realizing that we have more than one weapon. Darius (Songaila) has been getting doubled a lot, and when that happens, we start knocking them down."
The last Wake Forest team to go on a streak like this was also the last Deacon squad to reach the NCAA tournament, an event Dawson would very much like to participate in.
"To win the NIT was a great accomplishment," Dawson said. "To us, we beat five NCAA tournament-quality teams. But the NCAA is very special. If we keep this up, and keep turning it up a notch to get better for the ACC, the sky's the limit."
