CLEMSON — Brad Brownell has had some pretty good scorers during his time at Clemson.
K.J. McDaniels, Jaron Blossomgame, Marcquise Reed, Aamir Simms, Hunter Tyson, PJ Hall and most recently Chase Hunter. However, as good as all of those players were, and they were, none of them ever did what Nick Davidson did in Tuesday’s 74-50 victory over Boston College at Littlejohn Coliseum.
The Nevada transfer scored 21 straight points during a 10-minute stretch in the first half. In fact, no one had ever done it before in a Clemson uniform.
“It is funny, I need to watch it to see what happened,” Brownell said. “Obviously, a bunch of them were threes, right? He kind of just kept being wide open and then he felt pretty good, so he drove it once and scored, got in the post once and scored. He did all things you need to do to do that, and at the time we needed it.”
The 22nd-ranked Tigers (15-3, 5-0 ACC) did need it. Before Davidson started his streak of 21 consecutive points for Clemson, the Tigers trailed the Eagles 15-11 with 12:36 to go in the half following a Fred Payne jumper.
Davidson started his historic run with a jumper in the paint on Clemson’s next possession. He then made a layup and finished an old-fashion three-point play with a free throw to tie the game at 16.
The senior hit back-to-back threes on Clemson’s next two possessions and then he drove the lane and dunked the ball to give the Tigers a 24-18 lead with 6:28 to go before break.
After his dunk, Davidson drained another triple, hit two free throws and splashed down another three. The last triple gave Clemson a 32-24 lead with 2:42 to play before halftime.
Davidson finished with a game-high 25 points.
“I just found open space, let it go and trusted my work that it was going to go in,” Davidson said after Clemson won its eighth consecutive game.
In the first half, Davidson was 7-for-9 from the field, including 4 of 6 from behind the arc, as he paced the Tigers to a 37-27 halftime lead.
“He had not played like that all year. So, 21 points in the first half, he had an out of body experience,” Boston College head coach Earl Grant said. “He really helped them. We watched the film and he had not been like that.”
The previous record for most consecutive points for a Clemson player was 17 in a row by Tyson on December 30, 2022, against NC State.
Davidson, who finished the night 8 of 11 from the field and 4-for-6 from downtown, said he had no idea he scored 21 points in a row until Clemson’s Sports Information Director for Basketball, Ben Winterrowd, pointed it out to him after the game.
His teammate, however, was not surprised.
“I will tell you what, it feels like that everyday in practice,” said center Carter Welling, who scored 10 points in the win. R.J. Godfrey added 10 second half points as well, while BC (7-10, 0-4 ACC) was led by Payne’s 20 points on 7 of 17 shooting.