Clemson Men’s Basketball: Wake ends Tigers streak

One injury too many for Clemson Men’s Basketball, not to mention a few too many empty possessions and a hot shooting Wake Forest team spelled the end of Clemson’s dream start to their ACC season with an 87-77 loss.

The Tigers have survived and even thrived without Alex Hemenway, but when it was announced that Chase Hunter would be out for this game the writing was on the wall.

Wake is a good team on their own and facing them without either starting guard was a hill to steep for the Tigers to find.

Still, there was fight in this Clemson team as they rallied from a 15-point second-half deficit to cut the Deacons lead to 6 with just over 2 minutes left.

P.J. Hall scored 22 points and grabbed 9 rebounds, while Hunter Tyson recorded another double-double, scoring 19 and grabbing 14 rebounds.

Chauncey Wiggins was a surprise contributor off the bench, hitting 3 of 5 three-point shots, scoring 10 points, grabbing 4 rebounds, grabbing a steal and dishing out 3 assists on the night.

While the Tigers have been able to withstand the loss of Hemenway, the loss of Hunter was devastating for Clemson, as Josh Beadle and Dillon Hunter were unable to run the team effectively and have struggled to score all season on anything other than layups or short runners.

Clemson Men’s basketball was forced to play two young guards and it didn’t work out well

Beadle scored 8 points, but had 0 assists and fouled out with over 4 minutes to go.  He also struggled on defense against Tyree Appleby, as most ACC guards will.

Dillon Hunter had two assists, but was scoreless on three shots from the field, including 2 three-pointers, while picking up 4 fouls.

Simply put, neither is ready to be prime-time players, but have been forced into larger roles by injuries.

Clemson has a few days off before hosting Virginia Tech at 5 p.m. on Saturday in Littlejohn Coliseum.