Quarterfinals here we come!
Late on Wednesday night, the Boston College men’s basketball team played their second game of the ACC tournament, this time against the 6th-seeded Clemson Tigers. The Eagles were coming fresh off of a win over Miami on Tuesday night in the first round and continued their great play to another dominant win, taking this one 76-55 over the Tigers thanks to a 27-point performance from Claudell Harris Jr.
The game started with some immediate aggression from Quinten Post, coming hot off of the heels of his 30-point performance against Miami. He took several of the game’s opening shots, hitting most of them and leading BC to an early lead over the Tigers. Post was being very aggressive, basically taking what he wanted from the opposing defense, and his teammates followed his lead with a very gritty early effort. But that aggressiveness came back to bite QP after he picked up his second personal foul just about 7 minutes into the game, forcing him to go to the bench.
The early minutes without QP were a bit of a rollercoaster. Clemson immediately was able to find more of a rhythm on offense, chipping away at BC’s lead, while the Eagles struggled to find scoring without their big man. They had a couple of their shots blocked and ran down the shot clock to near zero multiple times, struggling to find open looks. But Claudell Harris Jr. was finally able to make a few things happen, hitting two three-pointers and a floater in the lane to extend BC’s lead all the way to 32-18 with just about 5 minutes left in the half, all without Quinten Post on the floor. The Tigers looked lost on offense, meanwhile, and couldn’t rebound to save their lives.
Both offenses got sloppy following that BC run, with a lot of bodies banging into the paint without many buckets to show for it. Clemson managed to get a couple of three-pointers to fall towards the end of the frame, shortening BC’s lead, but their offense overall was way too stagnant. Quinten Post never saw the floor in the first half after initially being subbed out, and the Eagles maintained a 40-28 lead heading into halftime anyway. They outrebounded Clemson 25-15 in the first half with QP sitting for 13 minutes! A total masterclass in “gritty not pretty” from Boston College.
Quinten Post was back to start the second half and immediately scored a nice hook shot as the Eagles and Tigers started trading punches. Clemson big man PJ Hall picked up an early third foul, which forced him to sit on the bench and limited the Tigers’ presence inside, but the Tigers cleaned up their performance on the glass regardless. They did get into some more foul trouble as the game progressed though, doing a poor job of keeping their hands to themselves on defense and giving BC a few extra opportunities. The BC lead hung around 12 points as the midpoint of second half came and went, thanks to some great shots from Claudell Harris and Jaeden Zackery.
Clemson’s PJ Hall started to find more of a groove on offense again later in the game, making some impressive drives to the paint and hitting a few shots off of the glass to keep Clemson in the game. But they couldn’t make their way to even a single-digit deficit while Claudell Harris climbed to 24 total points and the BC offense cruised past the 60-point mark with several minutes still left in the contest. Jaeden Zackery stepped up down the stretch to maintain that large lead, hitting some impressive shots inside to end up with 22 total points and lead the Eagles to an eventual 76-55 win.
Claudell Harris was the star of this one, finishing with 27 points and hitting some incredible shots, alongside an impressive game from Jaeden Zackery, too. Just like Miami had no answer for Post last night, Clemson couldn’t figure out how to defend Harris, even when Post wasn’t on the floor. It’s very hard to stop this Boston College team when their scorers are hot and they are playing their tough style of defense. Next up for BC is a match-up with Virginia on Thursday night in the quarterfinals.