CLEMSON — One of the biggest storylines in this year’s NCAA Tournament appears to be just a blip on the radar heading into this week’s first round games.

There might not be a bigger loss to one team than Clemson losing junior guard Dillon Hunter for the year with a broken hand. And yes, that is counting Duke being without Cooper Flagg.

“I think losing Dillon Hunter is some adversity,” Clemson head coach Brad Brownell said. “He was a glue guy for our team. He is a very experienced tournament player. That’s adversity.”

That’s high-level adversity and it stuck out like a sore thumb in the Tigers’ loss to Louisville in the ACC Tournament last Friday. In the +/- category, Chancey Wiggins scored a 2, while Jake Heidbreder had a 0 and Del Jones registered a minus-14.

Those three are expected to fill the void left by the Hunter injury.

Jones did not score against the Cardinals, was 0-for-2 from the field, turned the basketball over three times and had no assists. Heidbreder was 1-for-5 from the floor, including 0-for-3 from three-point range, two turnovers, four points and one assist.

Wiggins, who played just over 27 minutes, scored seven points, had one assist, two turnovers and was 3-for-8 from the field. He was 1-for-4 from three-point range.

“I thought they played a little bit up and down and that is to be expected,” Brownell said. “Chauncey got the majority of the minutes, again, too and I thought he did some really good things. Those three have done very well at times this year.

“I thought Jake made good plays in the second half, late. Probably, got fouled one of the times he lost the ball at midcourt. I was really unhappy with him, but looking back at it, he probably got fouled. Those guys will be ready.”

They have to be ready if Clemson (27-6) wants to make a big run in the tournament, again.

With Dillon Hunter in the lineup playing with his brother, Chase, Jaeden Zackery as a third guard, Ian Schieffelin as a forward and Viktor Lakhin in the post, the Tigers had the most efficient lineup in the country.

“Dillon sometimes played the point and sometimes he played off. He is experienced. He knew pretty much almost three positions. He was just a great mesh guy… The flexibility, the versatility that Dillon brings and the competitiveness and confidence.

“I have always talked about how he is a high-energy guy. There is also something about playing with your brother. He is probably the one guy on our team that would challenge Chase. Like, ‘Hey man! We need you to do better. Like turn it up a little bit here.’”

The Tigers are now going to need Wiggins, Heidbreder and Jones to turn things up if they hope to move on in the NCAA Tournament.

“We have already talked about it a bunch, as a staff,” Brownell said. “What we like, what we don’t like, what we see. It is not that easy to figure out because there is nobody that plays exactly like Dillon does.”

And that’s the problem.

–photo by Bob Donnan / Imagn Images