By Will Vandervort.
Is tonight the beginning of a new era for Clemson basketball?
True freshman Donte Grantham is expected to start when Clemson opens up its 47th and final season at Littlejohn Coliseum against Florida A&M at 7 p.m. Since 2006, only three times has a freshman started in his first career game.
“He is a talented young guy,” Clemson head coach Brad Brownell said.
Grantham is talented. He is one of the more heralded Tiger freshmen to start as a freshman since Trevor Booker started as a true freshman in 2008.
Last year at Hargrave Military, the 6-foot-8, 205-pound forward averaged 24.3 points, 9.7 rebounds and 2.4 steals per game. Since enrolling at Clemson, Grantham has been the talk of the preseason. The coaches have been thrilled with the way he has come in ready to play and thrilled with his playmaking ability as a scorer and as a passer.
“I think the offense is good with him out there because of his passing ability,” Brownell said. “He certainly can make shots and with his added size at 6-foot-8, I think that helps.”
Though he can’t totally replace what former Tiger K.J. McDaniels brought to the lineup, Grantham will give Clemson much needed size and strength when he is on the floor. McDaniels, who was known more for his uncanny athletic ability than anything else, was also strong and could rebound the basketball as well as anyone.
“That’s one of the things we are going to lose with K.J. and it is something you don’t look at first, but just his rebounding and his strength, I think K.J. is a lot tougher than what people realized or became a tougher player the longer he was here,” Brownell said. “He was really physical. Certainly his blocked shots were a factor.”
Besides Grantham, the Tigers will have sophomore Jaron Blossomgame in the post, along with 6-foot-10 center Landry Nnoko, playing the power forward position. Blossomgame, who went through his first full off-season workouts since coming to Clemson in 2012, is a much smaller power forward at 6-foot-7, 215 pounds.
“JB is a little bit smaller at the four in a lot of games in our league so to have a little more size at the three really helps offset that,” Brownell said.
Tonight will prove just how much that offsets things.
“This year’s team is more of the same as last year,” Brownell said. “There are a lot of questions with our team as far as how are we going to score and who is going to be the guy that can help us win games late? How good can they be? There are questions, although we do have more experience back with Rod (Hall), Demarcus (Harrison), Landry and JB. Those were all guys that were primary starters.
“Their evolution is what people need to see, including myself. How much have those guys improved and what they are ready to do? It is an exciting time of the year as a coach because you are really anxious to see how guys will perform. You have watched them work and put in the time and now you want to see them perform together, well. I’m anxious to see that this first month of the season and see how well we do.”