March 12, 2026; Charlotte, North Carolina, USA; Duke Blue Devils guard Isaiah Evans (3) with head coach John Scheier in the second half at Spectrum Center. Mandatory Credit: Bob Donnan-Imagn Images CHARLOTE – No. 1 Duke and Clemson have something in common: advancing to the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament semifinals.
Both teams escaped the quarterfinals with one-point wins, setting up Friday night’s meeting.
The scores for both games Thursday night were 80-79.
“We’re going to try to keep this going,” Duke coach John Sheyer said.
Top seed Duke (30-2) survived against No. 8 Florida State. Fifth-seeded Clemson (24-9) faced off against 19th-seeded and fourth-seeded North Carolina.
“We’re giving it our all,” Clemson coach Brad Brownell said. “We are doing our best to win every game.”
The Duke-Clemson winner will face No. 10 Virginia or Miami in the final Saturday night.
Duke took advantage of Isaiah Evans’ career-high 32 points to beat Florida State. Evans is from Charlotte.
“Coach talked about not really trying to pressure and letting the play come to me,” Evans said. “It ended up working out in my favor and I was really blessed to be able to come out for my team and give us a little boost.”
The Blue Devils came back from an eight-point hole in the second half.
“I think it just means we can get an ugly win,” said star freshman Cameron Boozer. “Obviously we don’t want an ugly victory, but we can have one if we need to.”
Duke played without starting guard Caleb Foster and first-team center Patrick Ngongba II. Due to injuries, both players will be sidelined for the duration of the tournament. The Blue Devils used just seven players in their tournament opener.
“It’s March now.” Evans said. “So now is not the time to make excuses.”
The Blue Devils collected 22 offensive rebounds to make up for some of their deficiencies.
“We have to step up with our team,” Scheyer said. “But we’ve got to figure this out. I thought it put us in a difficult position (Thursday) where we couldn’t really practice, and we’ll learn a lot from that.”
Duke navigated its way through last year’s ACC Tournament, also held in Charlotte, winning the title without star freshman Cooper Flagg advancing to the semifinals or finals.
Clemson and Duke met about a month ago and the Blue Devils won 67-54 at home. Boozer had 18 points and 8 rebounds in a game on February 14th.
Clemson will look to improve on its 35.1% shooting percentage for the game. The Tigers were without 6-foot-10 Carter Welling with a torn knee ligament Wednesday, and he scored a team-high 12 points in the first meeting with Duke.
Fresher in Brownell’s mind was how the Tigers were able to take down North Carolina.
“I’m glad there was a determination to resolve the issue at the end,” he said. “And I think we were able to win because of our experience in those situations.”
Some of that came from the effort of Nick Davidson, who contributed 17 points and 11 rebounds. He said without Welling, others would have to pick up the produce.
“I just happened to be the guy who stepped up and depended on the team to win,” Davidson said.
Duke has won its last seven ACC Tournament games in Charlotte.
“We love Charlotte,” Sheyer said. “It’s been really good for us, and we hope we can keep doing it.”
–Bob Sutton, Field Level Media
