No. 2 Virginia smothers No. 18 Clemson 61-36
Saturday night, Clemson basketball lost Donte Grantham for the season and many wondered how Clemson would respond. Tuesday night, it was the loss of his replacement, Aamir Simms, that put Clemson in a second-half hole that they couldn’t escape falling 61-36 to the Cavaliers.
Simms, making his first career start in his home state, played great through the first 24 minutes of action totaling six points and seven rebounds keeping Clemson in the game.
A charge call with 16:46 left in the game changed everything sending Simms to the bench. At the time the Tigers trailed 32-27 and without Grantham's replacement, Clemson never recovered.
During the next nine minutes, Virginia outscored Clemson 20-2 before a Scott Spencer three-pointer stopped the bleeding making it 52-32 with under six minutes left.
By that time, there was too much ground to be made up against Tony Bennett’s defensive-minded group.
After the game, Brad Brownell said Clemson, “Just got outplayed in the second half badly.”
It was a game of runs early as Virginia jumped out to a 7-0 lead before Brad Brownell took a quick timeout. The Tigers promptly answered with an 11-0 run of their own led by Gabe DeVoe who had all 11 of his points in the first fifteen minutes of play.
Incredibly from that point, Clemson managed to score just 25 points, but the Tigers were in the game at the break.
Trailing 14-13, Clemson put together a 12-2 stretch taking a 23-16 lead, only to be answered by an 11-0 run by Virginia giving the home team a 27-23 lead at the half.
The second half belong to the Wahoos as they outscored Clemson 34-13 and forced Clemson into 19 turnovers and 31.9% shooting in the game.
Simms finished the game with nine points and six rebounds doing his fair share to replace Grantham, but it wasn't enough as Clemson's 36 points were the fewest Virginia has allowed this season.
Three Clemson starters Elijah Thomas, Shelton Mitchell, and Marcquise Reed failed to find any rhythm in Charlottesville. Thomas and Mitchell struggled in the game, scoring a combined 2 points on 1-6 shooting from the floor. While Reed was just 3-10 from the field with 6 points during the game.
Clemson's next game will be on the road at Georgia Tech this Sunday.