Clemson was coming off another trip to the Big Dance. Presbyterian? Not so much.
For a while Tuesday, it was hard to tell.
Presbyterian won just seven games a season ago competing in the Big South Conference. Yet it was the Blue Hose, with five starters back, that looked more like the Power Five program coming off its most recent NCAA Tournament appearance, leading by double digits at various times inside Littlejohn Coliseum.
But the Tigers eventually got it going to avoid a disastrous start to the new season.
Clemson (1-0) used a second-half surge to overcome a frigid start for a 65-53 win in both teams’ season opener. Al-Amir Dawes scored a game-high 21 points while Hunter Tyson and David Collins added 14 apiece for the Tigers, who shot 47% from the field after making just seven baskets in the opening 20 minutes.
Rayshon Harrison and Brandon Younger each scored 12 points for Presbyterian (0-1), which led by as many as 11 and held a 38-28 advantage early in the second half before Clemson made its move. The Tigers went on a 13-1 run to take the lead on Dawes’ old fashioned three-point play. After Owen McCormack’s layup drew Presbyterian even at 41, PJ Hall responded with a putback slam that ignited a 12-3 spurt to give Clemson a nine-point lead with 7 minutes, 45 seconds left that it never came close to relinquishing.
The Tigers extended their lead to as many as 16 thanks in large part to Dawes, who caught fire in the final 20 minutes. The junior guard poured in 16 of his points in the second half, finishing just a point shy of tying the career-high 22 points he scored against Boston College in February of 2020. He finished 7 of 16 shooting from the field and 4 of 9 from 3-point range with all but one of those makes from distance coming after halftime.
Clemson shot 52% from the field in the second half while holding Presbyterian to 29.5% shooting after the break, a stark contrast to how things started.
Clemson had just two made baskets after the first eight minutes and change, and it didn’t get much better offensively from anywhere on the court for the Tigers. Clemson shot just 35% from the field in the first half.
The lack of touch extended to the free-throw line, where the Tigers made just seven of their first 15 shots. Meanwhile, Presbyterian shot nearly 41% in the opening 20 minutes and went on a 7-0 run with 5:58 left in the half to take a 21-13 lead. The Blue Hose went up by as many as 11 a few minutes later when Brandon Younger got free in the lane for an uncontested layup.
Presbyterian’s six offensive boards helped the Blue Hose score eight second-chance points in the first half, and they turned the Tigers over seven times. Yet Clemson stayed close thanks to Tyson, the Tigers’ lone offensive threat in the early going. The senior forward scored nearly half of Clemson’s first-half points (11), including the last five. His jumper at the buzzer cut Presbyterian’s lead to 32-24 going to the locker room.
It didn’t take long after that for the Tigers to roar back and take control.