2003 Top 50 List: Not eligible
Dan Collins List: No
Lawson is probably the fastest player I’ve ever seen in the ACC. Not the quickest; there’s a difference, and I’d give Muggsy Bogues and Chris Paul an edge in the quickness department. But it terms of straight ahead, get up the court on the dribble speed, Lawson had no equal. If the 100 meter dash while dribbling a basketball were an Olympic sport, Lawson would win the gold.
It’s not easy to create a fast break after a made basket, but Lawson did it all the time. Carolina’s big men perfected the art of grabbing the ball immediately after it went through the net, quickly stepping one foot beyond the baseline, and inbounding it right away. Lawson would already be running when he received the ball. It was like watching Ichiro lay down a drag bunt. The defense knew they were going to do it, but it was as if they couldn’t quite believe that Lawson could actually get the ball up the court that quickly. By the time they reacted, they were beat.
Lawson and Tyler Hansbrough were one of the great teammate combinations in league history. The three teams they played on all finished in the Top 5, all finished atop the ACC regular season standings, and all were #1 seeds. The 2007 and 2008 teams both won the ACC tournament. And their NCAA Tournament performances went regional final in 2007, Final Four in 2008, and national champion in 2009. The 2008 and 2009 teams both had the most efficient offense in the country according to kenpom. They had a lot of weapons, obviously, but Lawson was the engine that made it all go.
He wasn’t just a sprinter. Lawson led the league in assists twice and steals once. He was an underrated shooter, shooting over 40% from three-point range for his career, including 47% in 2009. He led the league in True Shooting Percentage in both 2008 and 2009. Lawson had the highest kenpom offensive rating of any player in the country in 2009.
In 2009, Lawson narrowly beat out Florida State’s Toney Douglas and defending winner #7 Tyler Hansbrough for ACC Player of the Year, and he finished as a second team All-American. He was the Most Outstanding Player of the South Region on the 2009 national championship team. The only argument against his Top 100 candidacy is that he made All-ACC only once. However, looking more closely at 2008, Lawson sustained an injury which caused him to miss most of February – inconvenient timing for All-ACC voting. Had he not been injured, he definitely would have made something. Greg Paulus made third team, and while I don’t wish to kick a man who has already been kicked enough, Paulus was nowhere near as good a player as Ty Lawson in 2008.