This season was a culmination for Crown Point senior Dikembe Shaw.
In the end, the 6-foot-7 guard/forward spearheaded the Bulldogs’ first appearance in a state championship game, and he was the runner-up for the Indiana Mr. Basketball award. But getting to that point was a multiyear process.
“It’s funny because his freshman year it was like, ‘OK, he has pretty good size, he can come in and rebound for us,’” Crown Point coach Clint Swan said. “As a sophomore, it was like, ‘OK, he’s a good defender. He has great positional size, he’s a good defender, so he’ll be able to really guard for us.’ Then his junior year, it was like, ‘OK, his shooting has greatly improved, he’s now a really good shooter, so he’s going to be able to score all over the floor at all three levels.’
“And this year, it was just him putting all that together. It was whatever we needed game to game. It was the ability he showed to understand when we needed him to score inside, he would go score inside. When we needed him to be dominant on the boards, he would get double-figure rebounds. When we needed him to make shots, he would make shots. It was a great way for him to just take this year and showcase his improvements over the course of the last four years.”
Shaw, the 2025-26 Post-Tribune Boys Basketball Player of the Year, averaged 17.4 points, 6.1 rebounds, 2.2 assists and 1.9 steals this season for the Class 4A state runner-up Bulldogs (25-2). Among the UIC recruit‘s accolades, he was named Most Valuable Player in the Duneland Athletic Conference, and he’ll be an Indiana All-Star, like his older sister Dash, who was a 2020 selection for Crown Point.
“He certainly delivered this year,” Swan said. “Like a number of guys on our roster, he had to sacrifice so much. He totally was team-first. If we needed him to get rebounds, he’d get rebounds. If we needed him to guard, he would guard the other team’s best player or their best big. If we needed him to handle the ball, he’d handle the ball. If we needed him to score, he’d score.
“There was like a five-game stretch toward the end of the year where he maybe scored a total of 30 points, and he never once complained. He never once said anything like, ‘How come I’m not getting more shots?’ or ‘How come I don’t get to play more?’ Because we were blowing some teams out, and he didn’t get to play very much. Never once did he roll his eyes or did he throw his arms up or did he complain. It speaks volumes that the best player in the area had, comparative to his ability, pretty modest numbers. On a lot of other teams, he probably would’ve averaged 27 or 28 points per game. But that’s just not what he’s about. It speaks to how much he was willing to sacrifice to see the team do well, to see his teammates do well, and it worked out.”
Indeed, the Bulldogs won their first outright DAC title and third straight overall, which includes their first since 2017. They won three straight sectional titles, including their first since 2016, and and they won three straight regional titles, including their first since 1998.
During those three seasons, Shaw led the team in rebounding each time and led the team in scoring in the last two.
The Bulldogs’ breakthrough semistate title landed them in Indianapolis, where they dropped a 52-50 decision to Mount Vernon. Shaw, part of an especially tight-knit senior class, posted 24 points and nine rebounds in his final game for Crown Point.
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“It’s just thinking back on the season and the great times,” he said. “It was extremely fun. I cherish the moments with my teammates, all of the little stuff. We had a special group of guys, and we made history.
“I had a great year. I started off strong, then losing Kingston (Rhodes) in the middle of the season, I had to produce more statistically. But me individually, I didn’t have any goals outside of winning. My biggest joy was us being able to take home the victories that we did because it makes everybody happier at the end of the day.”
Shaw continued to produce despite suffering a sprained right ankle in the fourth quarter of the sectional championship game against Lake Central.
“It affected me a lot throughout the postseason,” he said. “Right after it happened, thankfully our great training staff put me in a boot and iced it. They took care of me, for sure. But it definitely was a hindrance. I felt it through regionals and semistate. I struggled with it.
“But going to the state championship, I had so much adrenaline of just being there and being somewhere I hadn’t been before, I didn’t notice it. But before that, those regional and semistate games, it definitely didn’t help having that bum ankle.”
Swan appreciates what Shaw endured during the course of the season.
“He was banged up throughout the year,” Swan said. “About two-thirds of the way through the season, he banged up his foot., then the sectional championship game, spraining his ankle. As good as he was, it’s hard to imagine he was doing it playing through pain.
“You go back to the sacrificing he did just unselfishly for his teammates. There were a lot of days that he could’ve taken off, he could’ve taken practices off, he could’ve taken games off. But he never did. He never sat out a day of practice, he never sat out any games, and I know he was hurting. I know he was in pain. For him to play through that pain and do what he was called upon to do day in and day out really speaks to his toughness as well.”
As Shaw prepares to take the next step, Swan won’t forget what the star meant to the team and the program.
“Any time I think back to this season for Dikembe and what all he accomplished, it’s just what a great example he was to everybody else for future years,” Swan said. “If anybody thinks they’re not getting enough shots, they’re not getting to score enough points, I’ll be able to point to what he did this year because he put winning first, and it’s good that he’s still getting the recognition that he deserves.”
Shaw has left an indelible mark.
“I just want to be remembered as a winner,” he said. “We won multiple sectionals, multiple regionals, won a semistate and made it to state. I was a team player, someone who got their teammates involved and someone who just did whatever needs to be done to get the win at the end of the day.”