Clemson ends historic regular season with another dominant victory

Clemson fittingly ended its historic regular season with another dominant performance Saturday night against Notre Dame.

The Tigers beat the Irish 87-64 at Littlejohn Coliseum to finish the regular season 22-9 (14-6).

The 14 ACC wins is a school record. Of the 14 victories in conference play, nine came by double digits. Clemson also had five ACC wins by at least 20 points.

“A big win – great regular season for our team. Can’t state that enough. Obviously disappointed we’re one game away from tying for the regular season title, but 14 league wins, 15-1 at home, doing it with great kids and doing it the right way I think is unbelievably impressive,” Clemson coach Brad Brownell said. “I’m just really proud of this group. It’s been a fun group to coach, and to be honest with you, watch. They’ve played some marvelous basketball this year. Tonight was another example of that.”

Clemson was in control from start to finish against the Irish, jumping out to a 20-3 lead in the opening minutes.

The Tigers led 48-29 at the break and led by as many as 27 in the second half. All five Clemson starters finished in double figures as Ian Schieffelin, Hunter Tyson, Chase Hunter, PJ Hall and Brevin Galloway each had at least 13 points.

“It was a fun Senior Day. I thought we played terrific. Our passing and shooting was elite again at the beginning of the game. We made a bunch of shots, built a good lead, but then did another nice job of holding it,” Brownell said.

“I think we’ve had a terrific year. I think we’ve gotten better. We’ve had some injuries at some inopportune times that have caused us some problems. But we have a lot of performances like tonight.”

Clemson clinched the No. 3 seed in the ACC tournament with the win and will face either NC State, Virginia Tech or Notre Dame in the quarterfinals of the ACC tournament on Thursday.

The Tigers are on the bubble for the NCAA tournament right now and may need to win at least one game in the ACC tourney to make the Big Dance.

Brownell believes Clemson has the pieces to make a run in the ACC tourney and potentially earn an automatic bid.

“We have a veteran team that’s good, that’s gotten better,” Brownell said. “PJ Hall was a shell of himself for most of the first six weeks of the season and is completely different now. I think we have a very good team that has played some high-level basketball at a lot of times this year.”