BASKETBALL SITTING HIGH

The basketball team beat East Carolina this past Saturday afternoon, 79-66. Sophomore Jerai Grant finally had his showing out, scoring a career high 14 points in an otherwise pedestrian effort by the rest of the team. It was pretty obvious that it was a half-hearted effort as Booker and Sykes were out rebounded and we didn’t hardly block any shots. We were 14/21 on free throws.  Look for rankings later today.  We’ll update as soon as they come out.

***UPDATE*** The ESPN/USA Today Coaches’ poll was just released, and Clemson is sitting pretty at #11.

SCHEDULES

If you haven’t already seen it, we’ve put together comprehensive schedules for baseball, basketball, and football here at Block-C. The schedules posted stretch from 2006 to next years football schedule.  Just click the “Schedules” tab underneath the header image.  We’ve found that it works great on cell phones as you usually spend a while trying to find them otherwise.

DAWKINS STILL A FORCE

The New York Times published this article on Brian Dawkins and his leadership that has helped the Eagles run roughshod over the Cowboys in Week 17 and overcome the Adrian Peterson led Vikings in the first round of the playoffs yesterday.  The seven time pro-bowler and Clemson alum is only getting tougher as the years progress.

COACH SWAP/AXE IMMINENT FOR TIGERS?

According to this article in the Charleston P&C, Steele has been stated to be taking the defensive coordinator position after his fall out with Nick Saban at Bammer in yet another printed media news outlet. It also pegs Woody McCorvey as the new possible top choice for the offensive coordinator position but we’re gonna have to drop an assistant somewhere.  At this point, it’d be wise to keep Napier from a recruiting stand point but who gets the axe?  McCorvey has taken that position at Mississisissisisp[sppii State and Alabama in years past but was rather unimpressive at both schools in the role.

JAGS MIGHT BE OUT AT BOSTON COLLEGE

Eagles head coach Jeff Jagodzinski has been warned by the university that if he even interviews for the Jets job, he’s going to get the boot.  This is important to us Tiger fans because we’re using our recruiting as the bandages to nurse our bowl game wounds.  Tahj Boyd, four star quarterback out of Virginia, has received late, hard pushes by us and BC and according to many. He was going to be choosing between us and BC for his final official visit.

***UPDATE*** Jags is going ahead with the interview as per ESPN Radio, so we’ll see.

POSSIBLE COMMITMENT TODAY

Dabo Swinney travels to Delaware today to have an in-home visit with one of his top targets, 4-star DE Leon Mackey of Hargrave Prep.  Mackey was reportedly very high on Clemson since his December visit and a teammate of his, current Clemson commit Jonathan Meeks, said that when he spoke to Mackey Sunday night he said he was going to commit to the Tigers.

***UPDATE*** Mackey committed per TI and CUTigers.

Your undefeated Clemson Tigers travel down to Columbia to take on the Gamecocks tonight. The game will air at 7 PM on Fox Sports Net, but we encourage all Tigers to try and make it to Columbia for the game. There should be plenty of tickets available. Feel free to make this the open thread for the game once it starts.

Excerpts from Tigernet’s game notes:

SERIES HISTORY
Overall: South Carolina leads 86-72
at Clemson: Clemson leads 44-30
at Littlejohn: Clemson leads 19-7
at South Carolina: South Carolina leads 53-25
at Neutral: Tied 3-3
First Meeting: South Carolina, 39-18, in 1912-13
Last Meeting: Clemson, 85-74, in 2007-08

Probable starting lineups

2 Demontez Stitt 6-2 175 So. 	G 	2 Devan Downey 5-9 175 Jr.
(9.3 PPG, 3.8 APG)                	      (19.0 PPG, 4.5 APG)

22 Terrence Oglesby 6-2 190 So. G 	20 Zam Fredrick 6-0 203 Sr.
(12.9 PPG, 1.5 RPG) 				(15.1 PPG, 3.8 RPG)

12 Raymond Sykes 6-9 220 Sr. 	C 	24 Mike Holmes 6-7 230 So.
(9.2 PPG, 5.4 RPG) 				(13.0 PPG, 8.8 RPG)

1 K.C. Rivers 6-5 215 Sr. 	F 	21 Dominique Archie 6-7 200 Jr.
(14.7 PPG, 6.1 RPG) 				(11.1 PPG, 7.4 RPG)

35 Trevor Booker 6-7 240 Jr. 	F 	31 Evaldas Baniulis 6-7 210 Jr.
(14.5 PPG, 9.6 RPG) 				(9.6 PPG, 3.7 RPG)

BASKETBALL KEEPS CRUISING ON THE COMPETITION

Miami jumped out to a 12 point lead last night but made a few key mistakes and that’s all it too for our basketball squad to cock slap the Hurricanes across the face by a score of 91-72.  KC Rivers had 28 points and Terrence Oglesby added another 17 in the points party.  Miami coach Frank Haith commented afterwards that, “Obviously, that was a butt-whuppin. Those guys gave it to us. They were tougher than we were.”

BOWL PRACTICE NO WALK IN THE PARK

Coach Swinney seems to have our guys turned geared up during practice.  Check out this video on it.  From reports that we’ve been getting all over, the practices seem fast paced, extremely physical, and high in spirit.

“KNOW YOUR…” IS UP AT BIG RED

Big Red network finally got around to posting our end of last week’s “Know Your…” segment.  We won’t be doing a second segment due to time constraints and not wanting to force questions.  Instead, expect a comprehensive “Know Your Jacksonville” segment.

FRESHMAN ALL-HUMMERRICANS (SP?)

Mason Cloy and Brandon Maye have made the rounds on a few Freshman All-American lists.  DaQuan Bowers picked up some honorable mention rep as well. I guess we have Tommy Bowden and his recruiting staff to thank… so… Thanks Dabo.

DAVIS CLOSING IN

James Davis is thinking about the team first and winning before all his personal stuff.  It can be echoed at this point that James Davis is one of the best representatives Clemson football has had in quite a while.  He needs 112 yards of rushing to beat Raymond Priester’s all time rushing record at Clemson.  He needs just two touchdowns to surpass Travis Zacharcy on the all time touchdowns list.

A look at the numbers by year (as per his ESPN page):

• Freshman Year: 879 yards rushing, 9 TDs.  19 receptions for 152 yards.
• Sophomore Year: 1187 yards rushing, 17 TDs. 6 receptions for 115 yards.
• Junior Year: 1064 yards rushing, 10 TDs. 12 receptions for 51 yards, 2 TDs.
• Senior Year: 725 yards rushing, 11 TDs. 14 receptions for 123 yards.
• Total: 3,855 yards rushing, 47 TDs.   51 receptions for 441 yards, 2 TDs.

ESPN: Is Clemson for real? Currently we’re losing 67-33. UNACCEPTABLE. CLICK CLICK CLICKITY CLICK CLICK CLICK.

FOOTBALLIN’

The Post & Courier has some practice notes for you to chew on. Seems that the defense is a little smoother than the offense right now. Kyle Parker also seems to be making a lot of progress and should serve as a great backup to WILLY KORN once he’s scored a dozen or so touchdowns in the first half and feels like letting someone else have a shot.

Clemson has chewed up its 13,500 ticket allotment for the Gator Bowl and has procured 1,000 more to distribute. This article states that 62,000 of 67,000 seats have been sold, which is odd, since an article we linked to (lanked?) last week claimed 70,000 out of 77,000 tickets have been sold. SOMEONE STOLE PART OF THE GATOR BOWL.

Gene Sapakoff from the P&C backs up, surveys things, and let’s us know that it’s okay to like Tommy Bowden. He makes some great points here, and as we’ve said before, Tommy left the program better than he found it.

The Spartanburg Herald has a piece on Tyler Shatley, a Clemson commit and back for the NC Shrine Bowl team. The article mentions his penchant for smash-mouth football and he gives some thoughts on Clemson’s running game.

BASKETBALL UPDATE

AParker points out the best part of this article about the Tigers’ 11-0 start in basketball:

The biggest cheer, though, came only moments from the end when 7-2 freshman Catalin Baciu’s basket earned free tacos for the fans from a local fast-food chain.

More on basketball from the ACC Sports Journal, who really should kick us a membership with all the links we’re sending their way HINT HINT WINK NUDGE. While Clemson has gotten off to fast starts in the past against creampuffs, the Journal looks at this season’s matchups and proves that Clemson has passed some tough tests this season already. They also explain that depth may be an issue, with only a couple of the freshmen being up to the task of facing the rigors of an ACC basketball season.

ADDITIONAL NOTE

Congratulations to former Tiger and future hall of famer Brian Dawkins, who made yet another Pro Bowl. The ACC Sports Journal tells us that the ACC is representing STRONG in the Pro Bowl, claiming 23.8% of the roster spots. The SEC is represented with 15.5% and the Big XII has 9.5%. That’s gotta count for something, right?