Heading into the last month of the ACC season, Clemson found itself in a bit of a pickle. Projected as one of the last four out for the past two months by Charlie Creme’s Bracketology, the Tigers needed to make a case for why they should make the NCAA Tournament. A near loss to then-No. 22 Louisville at the start of conference play had been an early opportunity to set the tone, but since then Clemson had been playing pretty average basketball: Wins against weaker teams, losses to stronger ones. Simply put: to make the tournament, The Tigers needed a resume builder.
They had one of their first chances against No. 21 North Carolina on Feb. 5. And head coach Shawn Poppie’s team, like it did against the Cardinals, almost pulled it off. The Tigers posted three quarters of strong basketball, playing the sort of gritty, high-energy offense and defense that taking down a team like the Tar Heels required. Ultimately, though, it wasn’t enough. Clemson scored just eight points in the fourth quarter and made only a single field goal, slipping late and blowing its chance to make a case for The Big Dance.
“We wasted an opportunity. We had a great opportunity today to put a big feather in our caps,” Poppie said after the loss. “ … We’ve got six opportunities left … [his players] are very aware of where we’re at and what we need to do to finish this thing, to get ourselves in the tournament.
From there, the Tigers played steadily, winning against Georgia Tech and Boston College to further improve their resume. The next game on the schedule was against Syracuse — a squad currently projected to make the tournament and one that a victory against could provide a much-needed bump.
“We are an NCAA Tournament team and now we’ve got four games left to prove it,” Poppie said after the win over the Yellow Jackets. “We get a chance to go to a really good Syracuse team, and it’s a team that’s in the tournament currently … it’s a one-game season from here on out.
But the trip to New York didn’t pan out the way Clemson wanted. Poppie’s group dropped the matchup with the Orange 68-64, partly because the smaller squad fell victim to Syracuse’s length and league-leading ability to grab offensive rebounds.
Then, though, the next (and likely final) opportunity to beat a ranked opponent appeared. The Tigers welcomed then-No. 9 Duke to town for senior night, with a chance to take down a truly high-end foe and make a very strong case for a spot in the NCAA Tournament.
It wouldn’t be easy though. Coming into the game, the Blue Devils hadn’t lost in 80 days and were undefeated in conference play. They had taken down both Louisville and North Carolina earlier in the season, and would be looking to just about lock up the ACC regular-season title with a win in Littlejohn Coliseum — especially after the Cardinals fell to Virginia earlier that day.
Duke came out early on looking like the team it has been for the past few months. The Blue Devils outscored Clemson 20-8 in the first quarter, putting Tiger forward Raven Thompson in foul trouble and forcing the Tigers to play through their bench. The size advantage of the visiting squad was palpable in the early goings as well, as Duke’s length looked to pose a similar challenge to Clemson that Syracuse had.
Still, the Tigers battled. They turned things around in the second, outsourcing the Blue Devils 15-9 to bring the margin back to single digits. Duke looked lost against a Clemson offense that relies on guards driving from the perimeter off screens, as the Blue Devils botched their switches and hedges on defense to give up some easy buckets. Even on the offensive boards, where the Tigers have been one of the weaker groups in the conference, they hustled — grabbing eight in just the first half.
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“In Syracuse, we didn’t do a great job of rebounding at all, and today we made sure that we did that,” senior guard Mia Moore said after the Duke game.
Broadly, when Clemson was playing its brand of basketball — one that focuses on getting downhill, playing strong defense and moving around the floor at lightning speed — the Tigers were in charge of the game. They looked, for much of the second half, like the better team. The third quarter was a forgettable one for both squads, but the final period was when the home team really took over — just in time for the Littlejohn crowd to get into it.
Clemson scored 23 points in the fourth quarter, just seven shy of its total through the other three. After blowing a game that was similarly close through three against the Tar Heels, it seemed the Tigers had learned their lesson. Nothing Duke did seemed to throw them off. The Blue Devils, on the other hand, struggled to execute down the stretch. Still, the game came down to the final few plays.
First, it was Duke’s turn to punch. With 9.3 seconds left on the clock, Blue Devil guard Riley Nelson caught the ball in the corner off a hammer-screen play that took out defender Hannah Kohn and drained it, giving the visiting squad a 1-point lead and the chance to ruin senior night.
That wasn’t the end, though. Kohn caught the ball well behind the arc at the top of the key and cashed a shot of her own, giving the Tigers the lead with 3.1 seconds remaining. Duke failed to answer, and the Clemson players stormed the court in celebration — likely both because the Tigers had won on senior night against a high-flying opponent and because they had taken another big step towards securing a spot in the NCAA Tournament.
“We just joked in the locker room, [Kohn] had given up a three right before that, … she was in tears,” Poppie said. “So to make a big shot right back with tears in her eyes, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a game winner with someone shooting it with tears in her eyes.”
While the win is obviously impressive on its own, the implications are far greater than just the one game. There’s the postseason aspect of it, which should not go unnoted. But broadly, it says something about Poppie’s tenure and his future in the Palmetto State: It seems like, if all goes well, he’s quickly building himself a very capable program.
“We’ve been saying that we can make this place special, and special is getting on the national scene,” Poppie said. “And so to do what we did, to knock off a top-10 team in Duke at home, in front of a large crowd on national television, I think it shows that we’re coming, and not only for this year, but for a long time to come. We’re not trying to build teams around here. We’re trying to build a program … we’re going to make Clemson women’s basketball special.”
Looking beyond this season, the Tigers are bringing in ESPN’s No. 6 recruiting class in the country, headlined by No. 11-ranked guard Trinity Jones, just in time to replace a sizable graduating group. If Poppie keeps this up, Clemson could be in for an NCAA Tournament appearance this year — and potentially much more down the line.
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