Clemson Men’s Basketball: So you’re saying there’s a chance?

Yep, that was me that wrote off Clemson Men’s Basketball after a loss at 3-23 Louisville just over a week ago.

Houston Burnett was talking about me.

At the time that was the 3rd Quad 4 loss and the brains were talking about how 1 Quad four loss was bad, two was horrific and a third means your team should be disbanded.

A funny thing happened on the way to disbandment though.  One of those losses move up to Quad 3 and Clemson won two games, scoring over 90 points in each and moving up to No. 58 in the NET Rankings.

Most of the talking heads are still not convinced that a 21-8 Tiger team with 13 ACC wins should be in the tournament.

There was a time when that and 13 ACC wins would absolutely get you into the tournament, but that’s not the way it works these days.

I get it.  A couple of the losses are bad.  But more of the wins are good.

Clemson has four Quad 1 wins. North Carolina State has 2.  North Carolina got their first – FIRST – on Saturday.

Maybe it’ll all come down to Tuesday’s game in Charlottesville, which doesn’t give me the warm fuzzies.  KenPom.com predicts a 70% win probability for the Cavs and a 6-point margin. ESPN places Virginia’s win probability at 77.7%.

The last I looked Clemson was sitting on the last four out line, which would mean a win in Charlottesville Tuesday is a must.

The one thing no one is talking about is the Tigers opportunity in the ACC Tournament.

Right now Clemson is sitting in the four seed, staring at a double bye.  Duke is a game behind, but they face North Carolina State (home) and North Carolina (away) to end the season and Clemson has the tie breaker with a win over the Devils earlier this season.

Chances are Clemson earns the double bye and  an the opportunity against a good team when they take the floor in Greensboro.

If they don’t make the tournament it isn’t the fault of the NET.