Of the two teams playing last night at the Bryce Jordan Center, only one was wearing orange uniforms. But it was the team in home whites that got squeezed in the end.

The Penn State men's basketball team lost to Clemson, 96-88, falling short of completing a late-game comeback that would have surmounted a Tigers lead that reached as many as 26 points.

"This was a very tough-fought game, and we knew that coming in," sophomore guard Geary Claxton said. "We just fell short [last night]."

The Nittany Lions closed the gap slowly over the final 5:09 of the game, part of the Big Ten/ACC Challenge, using a 24-12 run to turn a 84-64 Clemson (5-0) lead into a much closer game than it had been early on.

Prior to that ever taking place, the Tigers used their up-tempo style and defensive pressure over the final seven minutes of the first half to turn a small tear into a gaping hole. With 6:34 to go, the Lions trailed 29-22, but ended up going into the locker room down by 19.

Junior guard Ben Luber said Penn State made some stupid plays in the beginning, and much of the Lions' demise was due to turnovers. They committed 14 of their 16 turnovers in the first half, more than the 12.7 they averaged in their previous three games.

Penn State men's basketball coach Ed DeChellis said pregame goals were to take care of the basketball and keep Clemson off the offensive glass. In allowing 22 points off turnovers, as well as 11 second-chance points (to its own two), Penn State did neither.

"You can't spot a team that many," DeChellis said. "They pushed the ball, they pressed, they got into you."

Clemson coach Oliver Purnell said his team is more confident playing in an up-tempo style, and that it got to Penn State in the first half. The Tiger's press defense forced the Lions into spats of defensive disarray and to throw away the ball.

"[The press defense] was what we thought it was going to be," DeChellis said. "We were throwing the ball away every way we could, and giving them easy baskets."

Penn State appeared to be able to hang with the Tigers' tempo early on, when Clemson's lead was no more than seven. With 11:39 to go in the first half, the Lions trailed 18-15.

Sophomore guard Geary Claxton, who had a game- and career-high 27 points, punctuated that period of time with a one-handed dunk, leaping from beyond the paint. But his effort was overshadowed by a hole out of which the Lions couldn't climb.

"The kind of frustrating thing is, we kind of didn't do what we needed to do to try to win the game," DeChellis said. "We didn't seem to be running through passes, we couldn't get open on the wings. We seemed a step behind."