The 2015-’16 basketball season at Clemson came to a close like a snap of the fingers on Sunday night. The finality of it was that fast and that sudden.

Though many of you felt like the basketball season was over minutes after the Tigers’ overtime loss to Georgia Tech, in the second round of last Wednesday’s ACC Tournament. Clemson itself felt as if an NIT bid was very much a possibility.

Despite four losses in its final five games, Clemson did finish in a tie for sixth-place with Virginia Tech in the ACC standings. It had 17 regular season wins, plus it was 10-8 in conference play. No ACC team that has won 10 conference games has ever been left out of the NIT Field.

What Clemson did not foresee in those moments after losing to Georgia Tech was 17 regular-season conference champions losing in their conference tournaments. What the Tigers did not see coming as they walked off the floor at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C., was a 24-win South Carolina team, who finished third in the SEC, being left out of the field of 68.

But as ESPNU’s network host slowly read off the final eight teams in the NIT field on Sunday night, the reality that the season was over finally started to set in. Like a snap of the fingers Jordan Roper’s, Landry Nnoko’s and Josh Smith’s playing careers at Clemson were done.

Like a snap of the finger, Jaron Blossomgame suddenly found himself at that fork in the road he has been trying to avoid – stay straight and finish off his college career with one more season at Clemson or take a slight right and test the waters of the NBA Draft.

Yes, over the next several weeks other team’s season will come to a sudden and unexpected close due to an upset defeat in part of the tournament they were not expecting to lose, or by some last-second miracle shot in a game they should not have lost.

And though it will be heartbreaking, and the sudden finality of it will be shocking, at least when those seniors and those players on those teams walk off the court, they will walk off knowing they had a shot and had an opportunity to win one more game to keep their season going.

That’s a feeling Clemson’s players and coaches did not get. That’s the harsh reality of March Madness, the disappointment doesn’t start and stop with the NCAA Tournament. It begins when a team with so much hope and promise, and so much more to give, doesn’t see its name come up on the television as part of Selection Sunday.

In the end, the Tigers know they have no one to blame but themselves, but that doesn’t stop the hurt. That doesn’t stop the pain. It doesn’t stop all the “what ifs.” It doesn’t stop the finality of it all. Just like a snap of the finger, it’s all over.

Photo Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports