No. 1 Virginia salts away Clemson
NEW YORK — On the court and in the crowd, orange was everywhere as Virginia and Clemson clashed in the Atlantic Coast Conference semifinals.
In typical fashion, the nation's top team turned in a blue-collar effort and salted the game away, so to speak.
Kyle Guy scored 15 points and No. 1 Virginia advanced to the ACC championship with a 64-58 victory over No. 19 Clemson on Friday night.
The top-seeded Cavaliers (30-2) got several crucial contributions from role player Jack Salt down the stretch and will play for the tournament title Saturday night in Brooklyn against 12th-ranked and sixthseeded North Carolina, a 74-69 winner over secondseeded Duke.
Virginia's only Tournament crowns in 1976 and 2014.
“This is a complete group. Their unity is as good as any as I've ever coached,” Cavaliers coach Tony Bennett said. “They're relentless ACC came the way they play, and that's the way we have to play to be good.” sure and tell Coach Rob I said that. It was unbelievable.”
The sixth-seeded Tar Heels (25-9) will face topseeded and top-ranked Virginia on Saturday night at Barclays Center in Brooklyn in a rematch of the 2016 ACC championship, won by North Carolina.
Maye hit a jumper to give North Carolina what seemed like a safe 72-56 lead. But the Tar Heels went cold and got sloppy and second-seeded Duke went on a 13-0 run, drawing within three on Gray Trent Jr.’s 3 with 50 seconds left.
The Tar Heels turned the ball over on consecutive possessions to give Duke (26-7) opportunities to tie.
“I think toward the end, we were just trying not to make mistakes and we ended up making mistakes instead of just continuing to be aggressive,” North Carolina senior Joel Berry II said.
Duke couldn't convert. Grayson Allen was called for an offensive foul, drawn by Kenny Williams, driving to the basket, and then Allen missed a 3, trying to draw contact on Maye.
Theo Pinson, who dropped the ball out of bounds with 11 seconds left, made two free throws with 3.2 seconds left to seal it.
“I made a big-time turnover that I needed to make up for, and I'm going to be honest, I was like, you're making these two free throws,” Pinson said.