At the Start of the 2013–14, Lawler was ranked 59th in the World rankings. In the qualifiers for the 2013 Wuxi Classic, Lawler lost his qualifying match 2–5 against Chinese youngster Lyu Haotian. In the qualifiers for the Australian Goldfields Open, Lawler lost his opening match in the last 96 to Scotsman Ross Muir 1–5. Lawler lost his opening game in the Shanghai Masters 1–5 to Mohamed Khairy. Lawler ended this run of bad results to beat Jak Jones 4–0 to qualify for the inaugural Indian Open. He defeated Indian wildcard Kamal Chalwa 4–1, before receiving a bye to the last 32, due to the withdrawal of Ali Carter, however, he was defeated 2–4 by Neil Robertson. He followed this up with a run to the last 16 of the third European Tour event, beating James Cahill, Liam Highfield and John Higgins before losing to Mark Allen 2–4. Lawler also qualified for the International Championship, beating Ian Burns 6–4 in qualifying, he then beat Aditya Mehta 6–4, before losing 4–6 to Fergal O'Brien in the last 32. Lawler lost in the last 64 of the UK Championship, having defeated Thanawat Thirapongpaiboon 6–3, before losing 1–6 to John Higgins, he also qualified for the German Masters, defeating Mitchell Travis 5–1 in qualifying. He also managed to qualifying for the World Open, this time defeating Elliot Slessor, also by a 5–1 scoreline.