Late rally falls short
The Syracuse Orange (9-5, 0-1) put up another offensive dud as they opened ACC play with a loss to the Clemson Tigers (11-3, 1-0) at the JMA Dome.
Donnie Freeman returned to action and even though he came off the bench he led the way with 18 points and 9 rebounds. The starting 5 was bad as they combined for just 25 points on 8-26 shooting. RJ Godfrey (14) and Dillon Hunter (10) were the only Tigers in double figures, but Clemson got this game played the way they wanted.
It was a sloppy start for the Orange who gave up a 9-0 run after an early 3-2 lead. It was careless turnovers (six in the first 12 minutes) and missed free throws which plagued Syracuse and gave the Tigers a chance to seize control of the game. The Orange seemed to struggle with the Clemson physical defense and settled for some bad shots and forced passes.
Kiyan Anthony provided a spark off the bench and a Nate Kingz 3 made it 23-18 at the under 8 timeout. Then we finally saw a George lob to Souare and his old-fashioned three=point play got the Dome crowd back into it. Another stop and JJ Starling found George for a transition lead and put the Orange back in front 24-23.
Clemson dominated inside the paint in the first half, out-scoring the Orange 24-10 inside as they took a 29-28 lead into halftime. They struggled behind the arc making just 1-10 while Syracuse was 3-9. Betsey led the way with 8 first-half points as the Orange bench out-scored the starters 15-13.
The second half started in a similar fashion as Clemson got their points at the rim and the Orange took bad shot after bad shot and it was Clemson by four at the first official timeout. Syracuse failed to hit a shot for the next 6 minutes until Freeman got his first shot to fall. It was 43-37 Clemson at the next timeout as the game continued to be played at the Tigers’ tempo.
Freeman got a little offense going but an Ace Buckner drive and one pushed Clemson’s lead back to 47-39 as we entered the final 10 minutes. A lob to Kyle got the crowd out of their seats and Syracuse was back within 4 with 8:10 to play. Clemson started to struggle to get good looks but the Orange couldn’t take advantage as the Dome crowd was poised to explode.
Godfrey picked up his 4th fould with 6 minutes to play and Dillon Hunter stepped up hitting two 3s to make it a 57-50 game. George came down and forced an awful 3 early in the clock and it looked like the end was here. However, the Orange showed some fight and Freeman kept hitting shots and suddenly it was 63-59 with 51 seconds to play. Freeman got to the rim and cut the Clemson lead to two. After a Kyle block, Carter Welling was freed on the in-bounds and made 1 of 2 from the line. Syracuse had a chance to tie, but Freeman’s 3 fell off and Clemson held on.
Syracuse shot shot 40% from the field, 5-15 from 3 (after starting 3-6) and 20-24 from the foul line. The Orange committed 15 turnovers, lost the rebounding battle by 1 and gave up 46 points in the paint to Clemson.
Syracuse is off until next Tuesday when they travel to Georgia Tech and the first game of 2026 is pretty much going to be a must-win.
Category: General Sports
