Clemson smashes Liberty, 79-39

On Tuesday, Liberty University’s administration allowed students to miss their 9:15 and 10:50 a.m. classes to attend the Flames’ morning basketball game against 22nd-ranked Clemson University -- with one caveat.

Students were given passes that had to be time stamped at the Vines Center exits, and no one could leave until the game was over.

It was a prescient move, considering the opponent and the relative youth on Liberty’s roster. The outcome was never in doubt Tuesday, as the Tigers routed Liberty 79-39, the second-worst home defeat in the Flames’ Division I era.

Clemson (2-0) had scored enough by halftime to win the game. The Tigers led 42-19 at the break thanks to suffocating defensive pressure that turned a normally team-oriented Liberty club into a bunch of one-on-one basketball players.

And that, LU coach Dale Layer said, was a recipe for disaster.

“We were out of character,” Layer said. “When the pressure hit, we tried to do too much. We tried to simulate this in practice. We tried to prepare our guys for this. But going into this, we knew we weren’t ready for this.”

That was evident from the beginning. Clemson, the first ACC opponent to visit the Vines Center, built a 17-1 lead in the first seven minutes, riding a blitz of 3-pointers from David Potter and Andre Young. The Flames (1-2) didn’t score a field goal until the 13:03 mark of the first half, and they didn’t break the 30-point mark until 5:42 remained in the game.

All around, the numbers were ugly. Liberty shot 30.4 percent, turned it over 28 times (leading to 32 Clemson points) and shot 56.3 percent from the free-throw line. Clemson out-rebounded the Flames 48-29, shot 41.7 percent from 3-point range and cruised to a victory in a game televised nationally as part of ESPN’s College Hoops Tip-Off Marathon.

“Everybody’s at the bottom of the barrel right now,” said Liberty point guard Jesse Sanders, who led the Flames with seven points but had nine turnovers. “We just got beat by 40 on national television with all of our friends and family watching. The whole school is out there supporting us, and we just got stomped.”

Of the roughly 7,000 students on campus at LU, 5,380 attended the game, LU associate athletics director Kevin Keys said. Total attendance was 8,143, the ninth-largest in Vines Center history and the second time the arena has exceeded its 8,085-seat capacity since seating was reduced from 9,000 several years ago.

The students were spirited, but Clemson seemed to feed off the energy. Used to playing at Duke’s Cameron Indoor Stadium and North Carolina’s Smith Center on a yearly basis, the Tigers clearly weren’t fazed by the environment. Forward David Potter, stepping in for one of the most prolific scorers in Clemson history -- K.C. Rivers, matched his career high in the game’s first eight minutes and led the Tigers with 17 points.

Trevor Booker finished with 12 points and 12 rebounds, and as a team, Clemson collected 19 steals. The Tigers also shut down Liberty’s Kyle Ohman, who averaged 19 points in Liberty’s first two games. Ohman scored four points on 1 of 9 shooting and missed both of his 3-point attempts.

“They do a lot of pick and pop with him, so every time he would set a screen, we’d switch off of him,” Potter said. “We didn’t want to give him any open looks. We did a lot of scouting on him, just keeping the ball out of his hands and limiting his touches.”