Brad Brownell blames Clemson loss on inability to consistently guard Memphis

The Clemson Tigers dropped their second game of the season on Saturday, losing in overtime to the Memphis Tigers. For head coach Brad Brownell, the loss was particularly frustrating because of his team’s approach on defense.

After the game, Brownell pointed to Clemson’s inability to consistently guard Memphis and its shooters, particularly late in the game and going into the overtime period.

“They have some elite shot makers and players,” Brad Brownell said. “I mean, their starting five and those guys can all score.”

In the end, it was an 87-82 win for Memphis. As a team, Memphis made 51.7 percent of its shots from the field and 48 percent of its three-point attempts. That included a total of 12 makes from deep, compared to just 10 makes by Clemson. Tyrese Hunter and Colby Rogers were both scoring in double digits for Memphis.

Brad Brownell then broke down the final sequence of the game, explaining how Memphis was able to close the final scoring gap and force overtime. That came on the back of a handful of mistakes that Clemson made and Memphis was able to take advantage of in the closing moments of the game.

“So, they put you on roller skates a little bit. We got hit on a ball screen a little bit on a ball screen and rotated behind it to [Dain] Dainja and he sprayed it for a three. Then, Chase [Hunter] got one going to the rim and the ball went loose and they converted in transition,” Brownell said. “All of a sudden, it’s tied. We got the ball to our best and certainly would have liked to [have] seen him drive it but he’s made a lot of those big shots throughout his career. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to fix it in overtime.”

Ultimately, Clemson was outscored 15-10 during overtime by Memphis. That ended Clemson’s six-game winning streak and sent Brownell and the Tigers’ staff back to the drawing board for finding a way to cover strong shooting teams.

“Again, I thought their shot making was elite,” Brownell said. “Our inability to kind of just consistently guard them and it cost us the game. So, congratulations to Memphis.”

Clemson now has just a couple of days to bounce back. The Tigers are getting ready to take on one of their biggest rivals, the South Carolina Gamecocks, on Tuesday, December 17th. That game is going to be played at 7:00 p.m. EST.