Clemson Basketball: Three takeaways from win over Radford
In what was the last non-conference game of the year for the Clemson basketball team, the Tigers routed the Radford Highlanders by a score of 93-58. The Highlanders came in with a respectable 10-4 record and had won their last five straight. What stood out as Clemson quickly ended any momentum Radford had going into the game?
1. Home court advantage is strong
The Tigers are now 6-0 at home this year, winning by an average margin of 21.67 points a game. The team will face tougher competition in Littlejohn Coliseum once conference play begins but it's still a good sign that any team that comes into Clemson is going to be facing an opponent that's feeling very confident in front of their home crowd. That's important as the next team to come into town will be No. 9 UNC Tarheels.
Clemson men's basketball is now 11-1 on the year.
2. Joe Girard's efficiency
Stats can sometimes be misleading when facing inferior opponents but considering Girard's poor showing in the Tigers' lone loss to Memphis it's been nice to see a couple of bounce-back performances, particularly when it's coming with great efficiency from the field. JG III went 8-11 from the field and 4-7 from 3, which is in line with his career-best efficiency numbers as he's now shooting just over 47% from the field, just under 46% from 3, and just under 91% from the free throw line. Teams are going to start keying more and more on shutting down PJ Hall inside but if Girard continues to prove that his performance against Memphis was the outlier and not the norm then the ACC is going to struggle with Clemson's offense.
3. A couple of impressive stats from this game
For the sake of not making everything about projecting ahead let's just take a second and appreciate two impressive numbers from this game for the Tigers. The first being perfection from the free throw line. Clemson was a perfect 14 for 14 from the charity stripe and those free throws came from five different players. The second stat is another incredible rebounding performance as the team out-rebounded Radford 41-10. Four times as many rebounds and a 13-1 offensive glass performance is how you end up with 35-point wins.
The Tigers will move on to Miami (1/3) to take on the Hurricanes as ACC play kicks off in earnest in January.
