Tigers' upset bid at No. 12 Duke falls short |
A late foul call and free throws made proved to be the difference as No. 12 Duke topped Clemson at Cameron Indoor Stadium, 72-71.
With a chance to go up by multiple possessions late, some inopportune Tiger turnovers led to Duke points, but Clemson maintained a two-point edge into the final minute. With 19.2 seconds to go, Duke called a timeout with the possession and down two still, where Kyle Filipowski scored and was fouled by Ian Schieffelin, who picked up his fifth and final foul. Filipowski connected on the free throw for Duke (15-4, 6-2 ACC) to take a 70-69 lead. Hall’s drive to the hoop on the next possession picked up the Filipowski foul then, his fifth and final of the game, with 7.4 seconds to go. Hall coolly hit the first after the extended break for a substitution, and he knocked down the next one to give the Tigers (13-6, 3-5) a 71-70 lead before a Clemson timeout. Duke’s ensuing drive by Tyrese Proctor saw some contact, an apparent walk but no-call and a foul call on Josh Beadle to send him to the line with one second left. Proctor then hit both to seal the final score. The ensuing inbounds saw contact on Hall going for the pass, but no foul was called. "It's hard for me, guys, not going to lie to you. I'm angry. I'm trying to watch what I'm saying a little bit," Clemson head coach Brad Brownell said postgame on the radio. "But felt like the game was taken away from us a little bit at the end. We had chances. There were a couple opportunities for us to finish the game better on offense and had a couple of turnovers...I'm just so proud of our team and our players for how they competed...Obviously we had a couple whistles down the stretch that were a little perplexing is all I can say. It's really frustrating." Clemson finished with a 15-0 advantage in second-chance points and a 20-6 advantage in bench points. Hall led Clemson with 19 points and ten rebounds. Duke shot 25 of its 33 free throws in the second half, knocking down 17 in the second session. Clemson sunk 13-of-14 second-half free throws and 18-of-22 for the game. The Blue Devils stretched their record 62-4 versus Clemson at Cameron Indoor Stadium. The Tigers survived a lengthy scoring drought to trail by just six at the half. Clemson led by as much as five points in the first 20 minutes, but the Blue Devils went on a 17-2 run over seven-plus minutes to lead by 12. Clemson’s Jack Clark was called for a technical foul at one point on a change of possession with the Tigers up four, and the Blue Devils outscored Clemson 20-10 from then on to halftime. "Yeah he (the ref) said he shoved the ball into him," Brownell said. "I watched it on film myself...What I saw didn't look like much. To be given a technical on that is ridiculous. That's again the emotion of the building affecting the officials and creating stuff that's not even there. I think that happened on several of them today and we were on the tough end of a lot of them." Duke doubled up the Tigers on 3-pointers at the break, 6-3. Filipowski was limited to two points over 14 minutes in the first half, however, while Clemson’s Joseph Girard III was scoreless in the same timespan and 0-for-3 shooting (0-for-2 on 3s). Despite shooting 1-of-9 down the stretch, the Tigers made a dent late in the first half at the free throw line for a 6-0 run to the halftime buzzer. Girard’s first points of the night, on a 3-pointer, cut the Duke lead to four points with 15:30 to go. A PJ Hall and-one play shaved the Blue Devils’ advantage to two points with 13 minutes left in the game. A Chase Hunter drive to the hoop charged a fourth foul to Filipowski with 11:53 left, making 1-of-2 to trail by three, but Duke’s Jared McCain answered with a 3-pointer on the next Blue Devils possession. After another Girard 3-pointer, an RJ Godfrey layup cut the Duke lead to one point with 9:02 to go. Fouled on another 3-point attempt, Girard sunk all three free throws to tie things up at 54 with 8:13 left. After a Duke bucket, Hall hit Clemson’s fourth trey of the half to take the Tigers’ first lead since the first half of the first half, 57-56. Hunter’s layup with under four minutes left gave Clemson a 65-63 edge, but on Duke’s next possession, Hall equaled Filipowski in fouls (4) and sent him to the line, where he hit both attempts. After Girard notched his 12th and 13th points of the half, Clemson held Duke scoreless on a possession, and Hall went to the free throw line and hit both for a four-point Tigers edge with 2:15 to go. "He was good, and I thought he was getting hit some," Brownell said. "It's hard in there and it's physical. It's a little frustrating because there's sometimes that PJ isn't protected as much as some of the other big guys in our league -- it frustrates me for him. I'll give him credit. There was some times that he could've got frustrated but he kinda hung in there and made big-time plays down the stretch." The Tigers return to action home Tuesday in the final 9 p.m. tip-off of the regular season (ACCN), facing Louisville, which fell to 1-8 in ACC play on Saturday. "Our team is fine. We're going to bounce back. We're a little wounded and this will hurt tonight, certainly," Brownell said. "Our guys were emotionally drained and really upset in the locker room as you would expect. We have to dust ourselves off. We've got a quick turnaround here with Louisville. Another group of athletes, so we've got to be ready to compete again very quickly." That was among the top five worst officiated games I have seen in 46 covering Clemson basketball. Here's a closer look at some of those *questionable* foul calls on Ian Schieffelin during the final two minutes of @ClemsonMBB's 72-71 loss to Duke.
Brad Brownell added in post that he felt the game was taken from them. pic.twitter.com/cok94JkGTL
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