Florida State was too sloppy in the first half. Four of their first five possessions were turnovers and that was just a sign of things to come. Despite PJ Hall and Ian Schieffelin not seeing the ball much for Clemson, their guards were doing a good job of getting to the basket and getting free throws where they were cashing in early.
FSU's offense continued to struggle, with Primo Spears and Jamir Watkins being the only ones finding any offensive success, and entered halftime with 9 total turnovers. Clemson usually only forces about 9 turnovers per game, so this is not the norm when playing them.
A bad sequence at the end of the half where Spears pulled up for a contested mid-range shot and Chase Hunter hit a 3 on the other end left FSU down 38-28 at the half.
Clemson had decided to pack in the paint and force Florida State to shoot threes in the second half. Considering how FSU has shot the 3 in conference play, that was a pretty safe bet. Any time Florida State drove, there were 2-3 Tigers around them with their arms up almost forcing the ball to go back to the perimeter.
However, Florida State started to chip away into the lead. Clemson led by as much as 16 with a little over 13 minutes left, but a 13-4 run soon after by FSU had the lead back down to 5 with about five minutes remaining. That would be the closest FSU could get it though. They had the lead down to 5 a few times, but the first time, Darin Green Jr. chucked up a contested 3 early in the shot clock, which didn't make much sense to me given the momentum FSU had.
After a bunch of fouls (including a double technical on PJ Hall and Jamir Watkins) and missed shots by FSU, Clemson would go on to win 74-63.
Florida State's first-half turnovers killed them. If you look at the final total of 12, it doesn't look horrible, but 9 in the first half killed a lot of their flow. Finishing the game 24/65 from the floor isn't pretty either. The crazy thing is how many blocked shots Clemson had. They came into the game averaging just 4 blocks per game and a block rate of 11.6%. FSU normally only has 6.2% of their shots blocked. Clemson had 9 blocks for a block rate of 13.8%, more than double what FSU is used to. That's a big reason the 'Noles were just 11/28 on layups and tied 32-32 in points in the paint.
Jamir Watkins was once again doing all he could with 18 points and 8 rebounds. He was just 6/14 from the floor and a lot of those were shots blocked inside.
Primo Spears returned to action tonight and put up 16 points, but was also 6/14 from the floor. Your top two scorers combining for 12/28 isn't a great performance.
Baba Miller added 12 points and 6 rebounds. No one else had more than 5 points. Darin Green Jr. returned from missing last game with a shoulder injury to go 2/8 with 3 turnovers. Cam Corhen was just 2/6 from the floor which is bad for a big. Just a bad offensive performance overall.
Joseph Girard III was 5/12 from the floor, yet finished with 24 points because he was 10/10 from the free throw line. He hit a couple of big 3s to start the second half to set the tone. Chase Hunter had 16 points while RJ Godfrey had 12. PJ Hall and Ian Schieffelin combined for just 10 points, FSU has to win games like that, but they just couldn't get it done this time.
Florida State returns home to play NC State on Tuesday.
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