Clemson’s men’s basketball team learned its position in the inaugural NET rankings released this week.

And if recent history is any indication, the Tigers have work to do over the next three months to realistically position themselves for an at-large berth into the NCAA Tournament.

Clemson (7-2, 1-0 ACC) came in at No. 88 in the rankings, which were revealed for the first time this seasonMonday. The NET, or NCAA Evaluation Tool, is used by the tournament selection committee to evaluate the body of work of potential at-large teams. The multi-pronged metric takes into account different factors, including strength of schedule, quality of wins and road victories.

The lowest-ranked team selected as an-large in this year’s tournament was Rutgers, which got in at No. 77. It’s the lowest ranking ever for an-large team since the committee began using the metric in 2018.

The rankings will be updated daily between now and Selection Sunday in March, so they will change constantly and, in some cases, drastically over the course of the season. Clemson, fresh off an ACC-opening win over Wake Forest, still has plenty of opportunities to make a push with most of its league schedule remaining, including a trip to Virginia (No. 9 NET ranking), a home matchup with Duke (17), a trip to North Carolina (39), two shots at Virginia Tech (41), a home tilt with Miami (47), two cracks at NC State (55) and an early-January trip to Pittsburgh (80).

Clemson also has three non-conference games left starting Wednesday at Littlejohn Coliseum against Towson, the No. 82 team in the initial NET rankings. The Tigers also need wins over Richmond (179) and Loyola Chicago (286) in order to stay away from what would be considered bad losses, but it’s the conference slate where Clemson will get the bulk of its chances to notch legitimate resume-building wins, including those precious Quadrant 1 victories.

At the moment, Clemson doesn’t have any. Top-30 NET wins at home, top-50 wins on a neutral court or top-75 wins on the road count as Quad 1 wins. The Tigers’ best win to this point is a Quad 2 victory at home over Penn State (51).

The Tigers will need as many quality wins as possible to help offset the glaring blemish weighing down their postseason resume at the moment. It could improve as the season goes on, but Clemson’s setback to rival South Carolina (294) last month is currently a Quad 4 loss, which is considered the worst kind in the eyes of the committee.

Clemson’s only other loss this season came against a top-20 Iowa team during Thanksgiving week. The Tigers enter Wednesday’s game on a three-game winning streak.

Dear Old Clemson has added the Tiger Sack Pack to our online store.  Save by getting the Two Pack of signed cards from two of the nation’s top defensive ends, Myles Murphy and Xavier Thomas.

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