Clemson's Historic Road Winning Streak Snapped in Duke Beatdown

The Tigers suffered their biggest loss of the season to the top opponent in the ACC. Now, where do they go from here?

Clemson forward RJ Godfrey attempts a shot in the Tigers' loss to No. 4 Duke on Saturday. | Rob Kinnan-Imagn Images

DURHAM, N.C.— No. 20 Clemson was stifled on Saturday afternoon, losing to the No. 4 Duke Blue Devils 67-54 inside Cameron Indoor Stadium. 

Going into the contest, head coach Brad Brownell and his team won the last 14 away ACC games, dating back to last season. Now, that streak is snapped and will remain at 14, being tied with Duke in the 1960s. Clemson’s streak was the longest one in the country before the loss. 

The loss is the Tigers’ second time that they’ve had back-to-back losses this season, dating back to the Alabama and BYU loss in early December. This time, it’s against conference opponents. 

Plenty of new firsts occurred for the team in the difficult loss. Clemson went down by the most that its ever been down this season, trailing by as much as 22 in the second half to pick up its third ACC loss of the season, and one that will see the team drop once again in the conference standings for the second straight game. 

Clemson also came into the game a perfect 6-0 in road ACC play. That changed after Saturday as well, suffering its first ACC loss away from Littlejohn Coliseum. 

Poor shooting led to a deficit from the start. Clemson finished the game shooting 35.1% from the field compared to the Blue Devils’ 42.6%. To keep a team as elite as Duke is difficult, but the Tigers couldn’t put it away on the other end. The Tigers only hit six threes, including only one in the first half. 

The guard play couldn’t get going once again for the team. Starters Jestin Porter and Dillon Hunter finished with a combined eight points for Clemson. Carter Welling led the scoring with only 12 points of his own. Besides that, the Tigers saw themselves in plenty of fits that forced shot clock violations. 

Brownell’s group had chances to win the game and played elite defense at times. In fact, Clemson won the turnover margin. However, Duke used more off of those, scoring 13 points off of turnovers compared to the Tigers’ nine. 

A Quad 1A opportunity was in the mix for Saturday’s game. However, the Tigers will leave the Bull City without that statement win that their team truly needed. 

Clemson will be back in action on Wednesday night, heading to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to face the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m. from the ACC Network.