CLEMSON – Clemson’s Ace Buckner scored a career-high 20 points on 6 of 14 shooting, while Dylan Faulkner had the first double-double of his Clemson career, as the Tigers easily disposed of Stetson 85-72 Monday at Littlejohn Coliseum.

Faulkner dropped in 16 points, grabbed 11 rebounds and had five assist. The Tigers led from start to finish and used a 12-0 run at the end of the first half to cruise to an easy victory to open the season.

HOW IT HAPPENED

• Clemson’s largest lead was 25 points, 49-24 at the break.
• The Tigers also got double digit scoring from Liutauras Lelevicius, who had 13 points, David Fuchs added 12 and Cole Certa dropped in 11 points.
• Certa added six assists to his game and had just two turnovers. Faulkner had zero turnovers to go with his five assists.
• The Tigers shot 51 percent from the field and connected on 9 of 24 threes (37.5 %).
• The Tigers outscored Stetson 12-0 over the final 5:15 of the first half to take a 49-24 lead into the break. The Hatters missed their last seven shots and turned the basketball over three times in the last 6:07.
• Stetson turned the ball over seven times overall in the first 20 minutes. Four of those came on steals. Clemson had just one turnover. The Hatters finished the game with nine turnovers, five were Clemson steals. The Tigers had 8 turnovers.
• Clemson had 18 free throw attempts in the first half to the Hatters three. The Tigers were 14 of 18 from the foul line in the first 20 minutes. Clemson was 25 of 36 from the foul line overall.
• Clemson had 20 points in the paint in the first half. The Hatters had 10. Things changed in the second half, as Clemson was outscored 34-10 in the paint in the second half.

UP NEXT

Clemson will play American at 7 p.m., on Friday.