In 1996, Rick Barnes was in his second year at Clemson. In his first year, he upset Duke in Cameron in what would be Mike Krzyzewski’s final game that season before he took a medically required leave of absence.
And he had a now-legendary sideline confrontation with UNC’s Dean Smith that nearly turned into a fistfight (Smith felt that Clemson’s Iker Iturbe had committed a hard foul and said so. Barnes took exception).
In ‘96, the teams met in the ACC Tournament and something stunning happened.
UNC was cruising until the last six minutes or so of the game when Clemson’s defense suddenly stiffened and held UNC scoreless the rest of the way.