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PJ Hall sat back and tried to take in everything. With his eyes full of tears, he looked around and saw that what had been just a dream for the past couple of years had finally become a reality.

His fellow Clemson teammates jumped around in celebration after the team clinched its first Sweet 16 berth since 2018. One of the players, senior guard Andrew Latiff, peeled a “March Madness” sign from a wall in the locker room. “This is definitely going in my room,” he said.

Another player, forward RJ Godfrey, recalled the feeling of entering the NCAA Tournament. The Tigers had lost three of four games before traveling to Memphis for the first two rounds, and the team was a trendy pick to be a single-digit seed (six) to be upset by a double-digit seed in the first round (No. 11 New Mexico).

“I had people in my life saying, ‘I don’t believe in y’all,’” Godfrey said. “It’s all fuel, though. You can’t take it in a negative way. You have to take it in a constructive way and use it to push your team and push yourself.”

The tears a year ago for Hall were much different. Clemson, which compiled a 23-10 record, was left out of the tournament field, much to the surprise of the team, as it felt the devastating blow of missing out on March Madness.

But this season, Hall, a senior and first-team All-ACC selection, was one of the catalysts who brought the Tigers to this point. Overcome by his emotions, Hall represented a promise made between himself and coach Brad Brownell, who got Hall, a top 50 recruit nationally out of high school, to believe in his vision. A few floors up in FedEx Forum, Brownell was informed of a different kind of history after the team’s second-round win over Baylor.

“Brad Brownell becomes the first Clemson coach to lead the team to multiple Sweet 16 appearances,” the moderator at the postgame news conference said.

“Ooooohhhhh,” said guard Joseph Girard III, sitting a few feet from Brownell.

Back in the locker room, Hall sang Brownell’s praises.

“For four years, I had to hear people hating that man,” Hall said. “They don’t know how incredible he is behind closed doors. There are people that support him thick and thin, and we love them. We love everyone. But everybody needs to know that coach Brownell is arguably the best coach to come through Clemson.”

Brownell is in his 14th season at Clemson, and his legacy lives in what feels like a perpetual gray area. He’s the winningest and losingest coach in program history (241-177). In the past five years, Clemson has been a top-five team in the ACC in wins, but there have been several years when the team fell short of expectations and the NCAA Tournament.

This year’s team broke through as an underdog against New Mexico and No. 3 seed Baylor, but Brownell saw this run coming.

Next up: No. 2 seed Arizona on Thursday night in Los Angeles for a trip to the Elite Eight.

“I think we’ve done a lot of really good things that show people that we’re a good basketball program,” Brownell said. “We’re doing things the right way. But again, to take another step, we’ve got to bust through consistently this time of year. In this tournament, it gives you the opportunity to do that. Nobody wants it more than me or our players.”

Some late-season struggles, including losses to Notre Dame, Wake Forest and Boston College, weren’t as bad as they were perceived, according to Brownell. But that allowed for an opportunity to challenge his players entering the tournament. One player in particular who took it to heart was senior guard Chase Hunter, a four-star recruit from Atlanta who committed to Clemson with a vision of being in this position. He scored only 2 points in Clemson’s opening ACC tournament game, a 76-55 drubbing to Boston College. But he has responded with back-to-back 20-point games in the NCAA Tournament.

Hall wasn’t a big statistical part of the game against Baylor, but his impact on the program and Brownell’s tenure transcends one game. One of the biggest criticisms of Brownell’s tenure has been the inability to land South Carolina’s top recruits. Notable players to leave the state in recent years include Zion Williamson, Trey McGowens, Bryce McGowens and Ja Morant.

Hall committed to Clemson when the program was in a bit of a lull, but he will leave the program as a multi-time All-ACC performer and a program legend regardless of what happens. The focus now is on an Elite Eight trip, which would be the second for Clemson, but perhaps the bigger-picture question is can Hall become a trendsetter for highly touted players to stay in-state?

Hall’s career, ending with a March run, is validation that Clemson can develop and win at a high level.

“He’s one of the kids, a top 50, 60 (nationally ranked) recruit who stayed home to play for his home-state school,” Brownell said. “That hasn’t been popular in my time here. It’s been hard for South Carolina and Clemson to get kids to do that. So he’s one of my all-time favorites, always will be.”

Clemson joins blue bloods Duke and North Carolina along with NC State, which entered the tournament as one of the hottest teams in the country, as the four ACC programs to reach the Sweet 16 (the most of any conference this year). In what was perceived to be a down year in the conference, the cream rose to the top, which validated Brownell’s stance against the NET and tournament manipulation earlier this year.

Following the win over Baylor, Brownell said it perhaps wasn’t the best way to go about advocating for the ACC, but he feels it’s his duty now. Quietly, he has become one of the elder statesmen of the league, alongside Florida State’s Leonard Hamilton and Miami’s Jim Larrañaga.

“I’ve been in the ACC for 14 years,” Brownell said. “I’ve been here a long time. I’m probably outspoken now because (Mike Krzyzewski) and Roy Williams and Rick Pitino and Jim Boeheim and Mike Brey (are gone) — I’ve coached against Hall of Famers. There’s a lot of new guys now. You’ve got to hold up the banner of your league a little bit.

“I know the quality of play. I’ve been doing this for a long time. I’ve been a head coach for 22 years. I know when I’m playing against good teams, well-coached teams. And so I’m not surprised in the least that our teams are doing so well.”

Brownell’s longevity is a reason Girard, who entered the transfer portal at the end of last season following Boeheim’s retirement at Syracuse, decided to commit to Clemson. This Clemson team is comprised mostly of players it originally recruited and built during a few seasons, and that culture has made it an attractive destination for transfers.

“These guys have been great,” Girard said. “Coach Brownell, I’ll tell the story — when he and (associate coach Billy Donlon) came to my house for an in-home visit, they were bragging about the locker room, talking about how great these guys are, how close they are. You hear that everywhere, but I didn’t understand what it meant until I got on my visit at Clemson.

“I saw it. These guys are a brotherhood. It’s something I wanted to be a part of and what makes it so special and exciting.”

Clemson has reached the Sweet 16 this year, but the next step above being happy in the moment is what Brownell pointed to after the Baylor game: consistently breaking through. Doing so should attract high-level talent and elevate the profile of the program.

As far as the criticism, Brownell’s not too concerned about it. He just hopes all parties involved are enjoying the ride.

“I don’t worry about it,” Brownell said. “More importantly, it’s about my administration and the folks that I work for and my players’ understanding that we’re doing the best we can to put them in position to be successful and showing folks that this is a winning program and there has been a pretty high level of consistency.

“We’re trying to raise the ceiling, certainly. I know we’ve raised the floor considerably since I got here. But I don’t get too distracted with all of that. I’ve got enough to worry about day to day, just coaching my team and planning for the future.”

(Top photo of PJ Hall, left, and Brad Brownell: Justin Ford / Getty Images)