The Clemson basketball program had one of its best seasons in school history in 2023-24, reaching the Elite Eight for only the second time ever.
Brad Brownell had a veteran club this past season, led by seniors PJ Hall, Chase Hunter and Joe Girard. Brownell believes that having older players was certainly beneficial this past season, but as much as anything, he feels having a player-led team was a huge boost.
“I do think experience can matter. I think player-led teams are better than coach-driven teams, you know,” Brad Brownell said. “So if you have strong leadership from your players, I don’t know that it necessarily matters what age they are – it plays a huge factor.”
This Clemson team wasn’t filled with natural leaders, but the Tigers work hard to help their players develop leadership qualities. Hall and Hunter in particular stepped up down the stretch and helped guide Clemson to a special season.
“I think there’s probably less kids that are excited about being a leader now. It feels like there are maybe a little bit less natural leaders now than in the past. And sometimes it takes years to develop leaders through your program, both with us and with help from folks across campus and our sports psychologist pouring into kids to make them more comfortable,” Brownell said.
“PJ’s a great example of that. It wasn’t natural for PJ. As good a player as he was, this was a hard year for him to be a vocal guy. It’s not natural for Chase Hunter to be a vocal guy. They both would rather lead by example, which is fine to a degree, but I think there are times when your players really need to take steps forward.”
Players stepping up from a leadership standpoint occurred right before Clemson’s impressive postseason run.
The Tigers played poorly in the ACC Tournament, falling by 21 points to Boston College.
Brownell went back to Clemson and challenged his club, but Chase Hunter and PJ Hall also stepped up in a major way from a leadership standpoint. The result? The Tigers won three straight games to advance to the Elite Eight for the first time in more than 40 years.
“That’s one of the things that helped us after the ACC Tournament is I went after my team a little bit and was really disappointed in them. And they responded, and then they responded amongst themselves,” Brownell said. “I think that’s what helped spur our run. So yea, I don’t know if it always matters what year you are, but I do think being an older player and having more life experiences sometimes can help.”
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