Dedric Lawson resembled a Broadway star taking a bow after leading his No. 2-ranked Kansas basketball team to an NIT Season Tip-Off title late Friday night at Barclays Center, home of the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets.
“This is great. It’s something you always dream of, going against a top five team,” Lawson, KU’s 6-foot-9, 235-pound junior forward from Memphis said to an attentive Big Apple press corps after scoring 24 points and grabbing 13 rebounds in an 87-81 overtime win over No. 5 Tennessee — a performance that along with his 26-point outing against Marquette earned him MVP honors in his first early-season tourney as a Kansas Jayhawk.