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With the eyes of the basketball world on them on Monday night, Nebraska seniors took the Huskers to the sort of victory they had so often missed last season.
James Palmer scored 20 points, Isaac Copeland had 16 points, Glynn Watson sealed it with free throws and Tanner Borchardt gave the substitute bench huge minutes when Nebraska hit Clemson 68-66 on the road ahead. 6,974 at the Littlejohn Coliseum and a national audience ESPN2.
It was not the same Clemson team that went to Sweet 16 last season, but the Tigers (5-2) sent out three starters in this group and finished 16th last week before losing against Creighton.
"It will be a quality win in March, as we all know," said Nebraska coach Tim Miles during his post-game radio show. "They can not take it from us."
On the same day, the NCAA released the first ranking of its NET system that will help decide which schools will host the NCAA Tournament in March. Nebraska (6-1) came out of Clemson with a win on the road against an opponent of the "Power" conference. find very valuable on the road.
Palmer added nine career rebounds with his 20 points. He scored 14 in the second half, including scoring 2 of 3 at 3 points. Palmer's first mark beyond the arc on Monday broke a series of 11 consecutive losses from the guard who returned to the Texas Tech game last Tuesday.
"Honestly, I think last Tuesday was on me, I had trouble right from the start, so I could not help my team and I could not help my team to help us win," said Palmer. about the loss to the Red Raiders. "So, I wanted to come here, concentrate on the defensive side and take care of business on the other side as well."
Copeland provided one of the centerpieces of the game, coming from behind to block Shelton Mitchell's layup attempt at the end of the second half. Thomas Allen recovered the rebound and threw the ball ahead of him at Palmer, which gave NU a 66-59 lead with a time remaining at 1:29.
Then everything broke up.
Clemson scored five points in the 19 seconds that followed and returned in the first two minutes. After Palmer missed a point, the Tigers had the ball and a chance to equalize or win the match without a stopwatch.
But Marcquise Reed, who entered the game with an average of 19.5 points per game and 15 on Monday, was whistled for traveling to the basket.
Nebraska then managed to put the ball in Watson's hands, and the senior tossed two free throws seven seconds from the end to give NU some breath.
Watson had 12 points and four rebounds for the Huskers.
It was Borchardt who was the unsung hero. The former front-row player played 16 minutes as a young Isaiah Roby and was once again in trouble. In the second, the native of Gothenburg scored twice, took two offensive rebounds and made a free kick.
"We just made enough games," said Miles. "It was every kid who did something useful."
Nebraska shot 54% in the second half, including 4 of 8 at three points, and seven of his 10 assists in the last 20 minutes.
The Huskers actually led for the last 18 minutes of the match, but never for more than eight minutes.
More importantly, they led to the end.
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