Clemson Basketball: Clemson 76 – NC State 80

Clemson dropped its first ACC game of the season at home to NC State in overtime, 80-76. RJ Godrey led the way for the Tigers with 16 points, with Carter Welling (14) and Ace Buckner (12) joining him in double figures. The Wolfpack was paced by basketball vagabond Ven-Allen Luben, with Darrion Williams chipping in 17, and Quadir Copeland adding an additional 16 points and a team high six assists.

The first half was a back-and-forth affair with only a couple of points separating the teams until NC State started to pull away around the eight-minute mark when a Ven-Allen Lubin layup stretched the Pack’s lead to 5 points at 26-1. They steadily built the lead as the Tigers steadfastly refused to put the ball in the basket, which, I’m told, is the object of basketball, eventually ballooning the lead to 11 at 36-25 on a Darrion Williams three with 2:45 remaining in the half.

The double-digit deficit appeared to snap the Tigers out of their offensive slumber, with the Tigers finishing the half strong on an 8 to 1 run spurred by five points apiece from Carter Welling and Ace Buckner. NC State took a 38-33 lead to the break, but had to feel like they missed an opportunity to end the game early at the end of the half.

After both teams struggled on offense in the first half, things got a little spicier in the second, with both teams starting to convert on offense. Clemson pulled within two on an RJ Godrey dunk at the 18-minute mark, kicking off one of the most frustrating halves since the last time the Tigers played a Will Wade team. It’s not that Clemson played poorly…or you know what, scratch that, it’s not like Clemson played any more poorly than NC State (this was far from a basketball teaching tape), but they could not get over the hump for the majority of the second half. NC State would stretch it to six or seven, and then Clemson would reel them back in and close the gap to a couple of points, only for the Wolfpack to push the lead back to five again.

It’s late, so I thought I would make this next section interactive. If I told you NC State scored their last field goal of the second half on a Darrion Williams layup with 8:16 remaining to make the score 60-57 NC State, who do you think would win the game?

The answer, unfortunately, was nobody, at least not in regulation. NC State played some of the ugliest basketball I’ve witnessed down the stretch, but unlike Clemson, they hit their free throws. I’m not one to complain about officiating between 8 am and 10 p.m., but it is now 10:01, and these refs got conned by the Wolfpack on multiple occasions. I believe it’s called playing a cynical style in European football, but hey, when it works, and it worked well enough for NC State to hit nine of ten free throws in the last eight minutes to force overtime. Of course, they were aided by the fact that while they were hitting two free throws, Clemson was splitting the pair from the line. The Tigers briefly took a two-point lead with 1:12 remaining on an RJ Godfrey layup, but that was quickly erased at the line on the next possession by Darrion Williams.

The game was tied at 69 with a minute remaining in regulation and stayed there until the final buzzer. It appeared Clemson was going to retake the lead with 30 seconds remaining, but after working himself free in the post, RJ Godfrey decided to throw the ball out to Dillon Hunter for a three instead of putting it in the basket; he didn’t realize it was completely unguarded. Hunter clanged the three, and RJ is going to kick himself when he sees the film.

The struggle continued in overtime. In fact, it got worse. RJ hit a layup to open up the overtime scoring. It was the only field goal the Tigers would score in the overtime period. They spent the rest of the game splitting two from the line. Darrion Williams hit a three to give NC State the lead at 74-72, and Clemson’s strategy of trying to win the game one point at a time proved to be unsuccessful.

Fittingly, the Pack salted the game away at the charity stripe. Carter Welling hitting a jump shot at the buzzer to cut the lead to four made everything worse somehow because it felt like the only jumper a Clemson player hit all night (that’s not true, but I feel like it’s true).

Thus ends Clemson’s bid to go undefeated in ACC play. Losing a home game hurts. Losing a home game to someone like Will Wade hurts even more, but the Tigers have built up a nice little nest egg of victories in the early ACC slate, which takes a little sting out of the loss. At the end of the day, the Tigers aren’t going to win many games where they shoot 32% from three and 63% from the charity stripe.

The Tigers will look to bounce back on Saturday when they head to Atlanta to face the Yellow Jackets in what I’m sure will be a dead arena for a noon tip on the ACC network. If you’re a Clemson fan in the Atlanta area, please buy a ticket and make some noise.