Flying in the Face of Fear
The scream echoed throughout a Breslin Center stunned into silence. As he writhed on the floor in pain Sunday night, one phrase kept repeating itself in Branden Dawson’s mind. “Please, please don’t let this happen to me again.” For a moment, the sophomore guard thought his worst fear had become a terrifying reality. Dawson defied the odds at the beginning of the season in returning from a torn anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL, in his left knee three months ahead of schedule and with nearly identical, jaw-dropping athleticism and leaping ability. But as he laid underneath Nebraska’s basket, clutching his knee after being fouled on a fast break layup, many wondered if the seven months spent in rehab went for naught. Tom Izzo was “crushed,” Adreian Payne was “nervous,” and Derrick Nix was “just praying that he was alright.”
