The Clemson Tigers defeat the SMU Mustangs in a tough ACC Tournament quarterfinal.

The Clemson Tigers earned a three-seed in the ACC Tournament, but that didn’t mean that they were going to have it easy. They were pushed to the limit in Thursday night’s quarterfinal matchup against the SMU Mustangs, which the Tigers took by a score of 57-54. Now, Clemson will move on to face the Louisville Cardinals in the semifinal round at 9:30 p.m. CT.

While the Tigers don’t need a deep conference tournament run to make it back to March Madness, it certainly wouldn’t hurt their final seeding. They have not won a conference tournament since 1939, so that would also be a nice bonus. On Thursday, was the Clemson defense that stepped up down the stretch as the Mustangs didn’t score a field goal after a layup made at the 6:14 remaining mark.

They only hit three free throws after that time. The Tigers offense didn’t really take advantages, though, as they only score points of their own in that time. One big reason for Clemson having so many issues in this one is that star center Viktor Lahkin got into foul trouble early. He wasn’t able to play for over half of the second half because of his troubles. Lahkin averaged 16.0 points, 7.1 rebounds, 1.1 steals and 1.4 blocks per game on 57.1% from the field and 42.1% from three during his final eight games of the season.

Missing that could make any team struggle, but frustrating for them to deal with as it was an avoidable problem. The Mustangs took that chance to dominate the paint with a 40-24 advantage for the game. With Lahkin gone, it was up to Chase Hunter and Ian Schieffelin to carry even more of the load. For much of the second half, it was Hunter alone that was doing damage. 15 of his 21 total points came after the break and he was incredibly efficient from the field. Schieffelin didn’t have the best day on offense with just nine points of 2-of-6 from the field, but his presence on the boards was crucial.

The forward had 12 rebounds, nine of which came in the second half. That is eight more than anyone else on the team had and double the leader on SMU’s squad. The Tigers will need their offense to step up if they want to make a deep run in either tournament, but they should still be happy after a hard-fought win against a solid Mustangs team.