No. 15 Florida State scorches Clemson

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida State star guard Dwayne Bacon scored in double figures for the 33rd straight game and tied a career high with 29 points Sunday as the No. 15 Seminoles stopped Clemson’s two-game winning streak with a 109-61 thrashing.

The Seminoles (20-4, 8-3 ACC) improved to 15-0 at home this season and stretched their winning streak at the Donald L. Tucker Center to 18 games dating to last season.

Florida State guard Braian Angola-Rodas added 12 points in the win for the Seminoles, who posted their highest-scoring first half in ACC play this season when they went to intermission up 51-25 and never looked back.

Guard Terance Mann was the only other double-figure scorer for Florida State with 11 points, but a staggering eight other players scored between six in nine points in the win, including nine points from reserve guard Brandon Allen, who came off the bench late and went 3 of 4 from beyond the arc.

All four of Florida State’s losses have come on the road, but at home they’ve been unstoppable, beating teams by an average of 20 points game in Tallahassee.

Sunday’s victory also marked the quickest that the Seminoles have reached 20 wins in program history, beating the previous mark held by the 1969-70 team that reached 20 wins on Feb. 14, 1970.

The Tigers ( 13-9, 3-7) had won back-to-back ACC games for the first time this season coming into Sunday, beating Pittsburgh and Georgia Tech, but all momentum was stopped in a big way against Florida State.

The Tigers’ 48-point loss was their worst this season, surpassing the 32-point beat-down they suffered Jan. 19 at Louisville.

Clemson was led by guard Avry Holmes with 15 points. The Tigers also got 12 points from guard Marcquise Reed, but it wasn’t nearly enough. The Seminoles’ 26-point halftime lead stretched to 41 points, at 85-44, with nine minutes to go in the second half on a near-half-court alley-oop from guard C.J. Walker to center Christ Koumadje as the Tigers had no answer for Florida State’s speed and depth.

The lead reached 48 points at 100-52 with three minutes remaining in the game. Clemson called time out and both teams emptied their benches.

The last time Florida State reached 100 points in an ACC game was in 1996 against Maryland.

The monster performance by Bacon, who was pulled with just under five minutes left in the contest after dropping his 29th point on a deep 3-pointer, came in front of an unusually high number of NBA scouts in attendance Sunday who were there to see Bacon, Clemson forward Jaron Blossomgame and Florida State forward Jonathan Isaac.

Bacon and Blossomgame each played well — with Blossomgame finishing with 11 points — while Isaac was held to a season-low two points on 1-of-4 shooting. Isaac did lead the team with five boards in the win.

Tigers center Sidy Djitte finished with a double-double in the loss with 10 points and 11 rebounds in the loss.

Clemson only hung with Florida State on Sunday for about the first four minutes. The Tigers grabbed a 7-6 lead with 16:29 remaining in the first half on a 3-pointer by guard Avry Homes, then Clemson watched helplessly as the Seminoles went on a 14-1 run over the next four minutes to quickly seize control.

The Tigers called timeout and came back on an 8-2 run to close the gap to 22-16, but that was close as they’d get the rest of the game as the Seminoles closed the final 10 minutes by outscoring Clemson 29-9.

Bacon is now 42 points away from 1,000 career points at Florida State.