CLEMSON – Less than a month after Clemson’s basketball season ended with a First Round loss in the NCAA Tournament this March, head coach Brad Brownell and his staff made waves in the transfer portal.

On April 12, Notre Dame transfer Cole Certa announced his commitment to the Tigers, joining Jaeden Zackery and Joe Girard as recent ACC guards to come to Clemson out of the portal. Certa marked the first transfer commitment of the offseason and the highest-ranked addition in the 2026 class.

Within the first few weeks of summer workouts after completing his transfer to Clemson, Certa quickly made a mark on Brownell and his staff.

“Cole’s doing great,” Brownell said. “He is more mature than most of my younger guys in terms of not only experience, but just the way he carries himself. He carries himself like a good player, like a worker. He was in here this morning. We lifted on Monday and Tuesday. We gave them Wednesday morning to kind of catch their breath, but he was in here shooting.” 

As a sophomore, Certa averaged 12.8 points per game for the Fighting Irish, and notched three 30-point games in the last two months of the season. The Le Roy, Ill., native averaged 2.9 three-pointers against ACC opponents last year, ranking second in the conference, and led the league in free throw percentage (89.2 percent).

He shot 36.7 percent from long range in 31 games, and made 43.9 of his three-pointers in the corner. Last season, with 102 made threes, Certa knocked down nearly as many shots from long range as Clemson’s top-two shooters combined.

The rising junior also received votes last season for the conference’s Most Improved Player Award, after he increased his three-point makes by 10 percent and added almost 11 points per game from his freshman season.

With guards Ace Buckner and Zac Foster recovering from injuries this summer, Certa has gotten to show off his abilities on a greater scale so far this summer.

“From an experience standpoint, a confidence standpoint, he’s a guy that wants to take big shots and you can sense it when you’re around him,” Brownell said. “And his work ethic has been great. The fact is, we don’t have many guards, he’s getting to do a lot of different things right now as well.”

With a 6-foot-5, 205-pound frame, Certa may have three inches and over 10 pounds on Girard, who led the Tigers’ three-point charge in the 2023-24 season, but the two have many similarities, according to Brownell.

Girard came to Clemson as a graduate transfer after four seasons at Syracuse, where he knocked down nearly 300 three-pointers across four seasons. As a Tiger, he led Clemson to an Elite Eight appearance with nine NCAA Tournament triples made. The Glens Falls, N.Y., native shot 41.3 percent from beyond the arc in an orange and white uniform.

Like Certa, Girard was never afraid of the big moments.

“There’s similarities there,” Brownell said. “And that’s why they can both really shoot is they don’t ever think they’re going to miss. When they cross half court is when they think they’re ready to shoot. But that’s what you need, man. You need guys that, you know, have that kind of belief, and Cole has that.” 

In Girard’s season with the Tigers, the veteran made over one third of Clemson’s threes by himself. Similarly, Certa made 36 percent of the Fighting Irish’s long shots last season. 

At Clemson, Girard also advanced other aspects of his game under the Tigers coaching staff. The shooter also notched career-highs in rebounds and blocks, and recorded his fewest turnovers in his collegiate career his graduate season.

Certa also made jumps in assists, rebounds, and steals from his rookie year to his sophomore season, and under Brownell, could use his length to bother shorter guards if defensive improvements come with time.

The Tigers have several months before Certa and three other transfers join the fold of familiar names like Buckner, Foster, and Carter Welling. However, with one of the ACC’s premiere shooters now residing at Littlejohn Coliseum, Clemson fans can expect to associate this fall with more three-pointers, and another conference transfer guard.

If he comes out to have any of the success that Girard and Zackery found, he will be remembered fondly in Clemson.