CLEMSON — Has a lopsided win over North Carolina ever felt so blah?
It sure did Monday night as No. 23 Clemson (20-5, 12-1 ACC) made short work of the Tar Heels, an almost color-by-numbers 85-65 rout that gave the Tigers a rare sweep of the four Tobacco Road schools. It completed a two-wins-in-three-days trick during which Clemson sent the ACC’s traditional standard bearers back to the Triangle with some soul-searching to do.
There wasn’t a gratuitous court storming this time around, either. The 8,704 folks jammed into Littlejohn Coliseum minded their manners and made orderly exits. Perhaps they flushed the go-crazy juice out of their system when they went bonkers Saturday after beating then-No. 2 Duke.
The harsh truth is the Tar Heels (14-11, 7-6) are mediocre by 2025 ACC standards, dreadful by historical UNC standards. Clemson did what it was supposed to do and seemed almost robotic in how it went about its business. That’s the sign of a confident team trending in the right direction under confident leadership. The Tar Heels were cooked well before halftime.
UNC coach Hubert Davis is safe for another season — there’s no way the school makes changes for both basketball and football within the same year. But the wine-and-cheese crowd is restless. We thought the Bill Belichick saga was intriguing; whatever transpir
Notoriously consistent
Leonard Hamilton announced last week he’ll be stepping down after 23 years at Florida State. That leaves Brownell, in his 15th season at Clemson, as the longest-tenured ACC coach.
Brownell entered 2023 with three NCAA Tournament appearances and a few NIT berths in the 12 years that had a postseason (COVID-19 wrecked 2020). And while Clemson has had the fifth-most ACC wins since making the Sweet 16 in 2018, most of the teams ahead of it have been national title winners or contenders.
All of that is good, though not really great. Plenty of folks were waiting for him to similarly express what Hamilton said when he stepped down, that “there comes a time when it’s time” and for the school “to get someone to reenergize the program.”
But, in a strange twist, Brownell is building more momentum now that at any point since he was hired in 2010.
Clemson has won five straight against top-five teams going back to 2019-20, the longest such streak in the country. Three of its four losses have come in overtime; the others were Nov. 4 at Boise State (84-71) and Jan. 7 at Louisville (74-64).
And all of this following up the second Elite Eight appearance in school history and before that a 23-11 season two years ago that should have included an NCAA trip. It’s setting up to be the best three-year run of his 23-season career.
