Men’s Basketball to Face Tough S.C. State Tonight at 7:30 PM

Nov. 23, 2005

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This will be South Carolina State’s fourth game of the season.The Bulldogs lost their opener to New Mexico by a 56-47 score onNovember 18, then defeated Southern Utah, 66-59 on the 19th, beforelosing to Mississippi, 71-47 on the 20th. This will be the eighthmeeting between Clemson and South Carolina State. The Tigers hold a6-1 lead in the series that dates to a 93-70 Clemson victory in the1988-89 season. South Carolina State gained its only victory overthe Tigers during the 1999-00 season by a 71-68 score. In fact, thelast two meetings between the two teams have been decided by threepoints. Clemson won the last meeting by a 77-74 score in 2003-04,Oliver Purnell’s first year as Clemson head coach. This will be thethird of three games against MEAC teams to open the season forClemson. The Tigers are 20-1 lifetime against MEAC school.Clemson’s only loss to a MEAC school was South Carolina State’s winat Clemson in 1999-00.. Clemson is coming off a 102-71 win overCoppin State. That was Clemson’s first 100-point game since a100-86 overtime triumph in 2003-04, Oliver Purnell’s first year. Itmarked the first time Clemson has scored 100 points in regulationsince a 111-108 loss to Georgia Tech in 2000-01. Clemson has been abalanced team offensively over the first two games. The Tigers havesix players averaging in double figures over the first two games.Shawan Robinson, Clemson’s leading returning scorer from last year,leads the club with a 14.0 average. Robinson had two morethree-point goals against Coppin State and is now 6-11 for theseason. He is tied for 4th in Clemson history with Andrius Jurkunasin three-point goals with 146. “Energy Brothers” James Mays and SamPerry are two of Clemson’s six players averaging in double figuresso far this year. Perry tied his career high in scoring with 14points in the opener against Bethune Cookman, then Mays scored hiscareer high in the win over Coppin State when he scored 18 points.Mays had a career high 14 rebounds in the opener. Akin Akingbala iscoming off his best performance as a Clemson Tiger. He establishedcareer highs in scoring (19) and rebounds (14) in the win overCoppin State. He achieved that in just 24 minutes. James Mays (18)combined for 52 points in the win over Coppin State. They averageda combined 17 points per game last year. Clemson had 30 assists inthe victory over Coppin State. That was the most assists by aClemson team since the Tigers had 31 in a win over Youngstown Stateduring the 1988-89 season.