Brad Brownell evaluates Clemson's NCAA Tournament resume

Clemson finished the regular season strong defeating Notre Dame on their home court Saturday 87-64. With the month of March having already started, madness is right around the corner. And after his latest win Tigers’ head coach Brad Brownell was asked what a pitch from him to the selection committee to have Clemson in the tournament would sound like.

“I think we’ve had a terrific year, I think we’ve gotten better,” Brownell said. “We’ve had some injuries at some inopportune times that have caused us some problems, but we have a lot of performances like tonight. I know at one point here we had four Quad 1 wins and three of them are on the road, and I think winning away from home I think is significant, and to do it like we did I think is impressive.”

The Tigers finished the regular season with a 22-9 overall record and a 14-6 record in conference play. Clemson was ranked in the Top 25 at one point this season, rattled off seven straight wins, and stood toe to toe with multiple ranked opponents, just a few of the reasons why Brownell believes his Tigers belong in the NCAA tournament.

“We’ve had a lot of games where we’ve beat people handily, which I think speaks to the quality of our play. We’ve had a couple of bad nights, but I just think if you look at who we’ve beaten and who we can play with, there’s no question we can go into the tournament and win games, win multiple games,” Brownell said.

Clemson recognized five seniors on senior night Saturday, representing an experienced group that has led the Tigers all season alongside Chase Hunter and PJ Hall, who notched 1,000 career points versus the Fighting Irish.

“We have a veteran team that’s good, that’s gotten better. PJ Hall was a shell of himself probably for most of the first six weeks of the season and is completely different now,” Brownell said. “And I don’t know if all those things will be considered, but I think we have a very good team that has played some high level basketball at a lot of times this year.”

Brownell definitely makes a strong case, as the Tigers most recent win solidified them the No. 3 seed in the upcoming ACC Tournament, which gives them a bye in the first two rounds. Only time will tell if the Tigers will be dancing, as they await NC State, Virginia Tech, or Notre Dame again on Thursday in their first game of the conference tournament.