Clemson's Charleston Classic Win Provides Promising Takeaway for 2025/26 Season

This past weekend, the Clemson men’s basketball team picked up its two biggest wins of the early season with a Charleston Classic Championship to add to its trophy case.

The 70-67 win over West Virginia on Friday, followed by an overtime win with the Georgia Bulldogs on Sunday afternoon, to pick up the team’s first Quad 1 win of the season.

Clemson has many new faces on this year’s team, with 10 players on the roster not playing on the team a season ago. Only guard Dillon Hunter returned this season as a Tiger who had minutes on last season’s rotation.

Despite the small sample size, the Tigers proved something over the course of this weekend: they can win any type of game against any style.

Just ask head coach Brad Brownell, who had to deal with two different styles of play over the three days. The Tigers played a defensive battle against the Mountaineers on Friday and a high-octane offense on Sunday, and still were able to come out on the positive end.

“It was great because two completely different teams and styles,” Brownell said after Sunday’s game. “West Virginia’s very physical, half-court, grind-it, today is the opposite. It’s full-court press, it’s up and down, it’s transition, it’s handling different styles of pressure, and those things make your team better. Obviously, you’re trying to identify all different kinds of things to improve as a coach, and this was a really good weekend for us to learn a little bit more about our team.”

Clemson was on the brink of losing both games as well. The Tigers were down as much as 11 against West Virginia before a ferocious comeback put them into Sunday’s championship game. Against Georgia, the Bulldogs also mounted a double-digit lead before Brownell’s team put them back in the game.

Guard Jestin Porter, who was named the Charleston Classic MVP after the tournament, says the team will continue to “look to build off of those two wins” going forward.

“I’m glad we’re figuring out at the right time, man,” Porter said. “I feel like every game, we are coming along.”

Hunter, who entered the year as one of the main leaders on the team, was waiting for his team to show this amount of competitiveness in a game. He was able to see it in both games, helping set the tone for the remainder of the non-conference schedule.

“We have a competitive group,” he said. “So, I knew even coming in from the summer, you know, my past years, the work we put in, and we got a lot of young guys, so getting them used to these environments, these types of games, because this is going to be ACC play.”

Clemson’s bench continues to shine, while the starters stepped up in the win over West Virginia. The Mountaineers matched the Tigers in bench points, but important games from Porter, Hunter and forward Carter Welling helped propel the team past its opponent.

Against Georgia, six players entered double-digits in the win, outscoring the Bulldogs’ bench by nine. Bench pieces Efrem “Butta” Johnson and Zac Foster added 13 and 11 points, respectively, in limited-minute roles.

The Tigers also hit 22 free throws in the win, sealing the deal through the charity stripe to help secure their biggest win of the season.

“Georgia is fast and athletic, and they came after us, but thought our guys did a really nice job of settling into the game and then getting more used to the pressure the longer that it went,” Brownell said. “I thought we did a lot of good things in the second half. A lot of late-game stuff that we can practice, which will be good for us, but for our guys that made big free throws and to handle the ball against that kind of pressure late, these two games were terrific, and it was a really good weekend for us.”

Clemson can win defensive battles. It can shoot the lights out to beat offenses that are prone to scoring. So, what does that mean for the ceiling of this team?

Beating other NCAA Tournament bubble teams makes a statement early on, but Clemson will need another Quad 1 win to prove it’s legitimate going forward. The team has to go to Alabama on Dec. 3, to BYU in New York City six days after, and Cincinnati right before Christmas to help add to its resume.

Win just one of those games, and the expectations will shift once again. • ⁃

“This was a great tournament for us,” Brownell said. “Four good teams in our bracket, and so, you know, that you’re going to get two great games, and I think that’s what this is really about, is in your non-conference, you’re going to have some guaranteed games at home to play, but then in the neutral site games, you really want to be challenged. You want good competition. We got that today against Georgia, and we certainly got it Friday against West Virginia.”

Clemson goes back home for a matchup on Friday against Alabama A&M at Littlejohn Coliseum next. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m.