With his team up three points, John Newman grabbed a key offensive rebound with 17.6 seconds to play after a Marcquise Reed miss to help seal Clemson’s 75-69 victory over Wright State Tuesday at Littlejohn Coliseum in Clemson.

With the win, the Tigers advance to the second round of the NIT Tournament where it will play the winner of Wednesday’s Wichita State-Furman game.

“That was a really good, hard-earned win against a tough team,” Clemson head coach Brad Brownell said after the game. “You could tell they are used to winning. We obviously got out of the gates great and made a bunch of threes right away and then the game settled a little bit and they got into the game.

“We knew the game was going to be tough.”

With Clemson clinging to a 72-69 lead, the Raiders’ Loudon Love missed two free throws with 47 seconds to play. Aamir Simms grabbed the rebound for Clemson as it ran the game clock down to 20 seconds. Reed, who scored a game-high 24 points to lead the Tigers, then put a tear-drop up, which bounced off the back of the rim.

But Newman did not give up on the play and fought off Love and another Raider to grab the rebound.

The freshman was then poked in the eye by Love, who was trying to strip the ball away. Newman made one of two free throws to give the Tigers a 73-69 lead.

“He made a lot of really good plays,” Brownell said. “He made a really nice pull up. He made another jump shot. Certainly, the last rebound was big. He made the free throw to put us up four … He gave us some good minutes defensively. He was a live body. He was active.

“He is getting better. There are a lot of things he still needs to do better to be consistent, but that was fun and good and obviously that is a product of Shelton (Mitchell) not playing. He got 20 some odd minutes and he did pretty well tonight.”

Clemson (20-13) played the game without Mitchell, who missed it with a knee injury. Brownell said after the game an MRI on Monday revealed the senior point guard will have to undergo surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his knee.

Brownell said Mitchell is likely done for the season.

Mitchell has played the whole season hurt. However, Brownell said the knee got worse as the season wore on and his senior guard could barely even move it on Saturday.

The Raiders (21-14) missed their last few shots at a comeback on the other end and Clyde Trapp, who earlier scored five critical points late in the game for Clemson, made two foul shots with 1.5 seconds to play for the final margin.

“I thought Clyde showed some growth in terms of stepping up and making a couple of big shots and big plays,” Brownell said. “Those were important plays because he scored a bunch of them right at the end when we needed them.”

Clinging to a one-point lead, Trapp hit a three-pointer with 3:18 to play that put the Tigers up 66-62. He then followed that with another jumper on their next possession for a two-basket lead at 68-64 with 2:43 to go.

Besides Reed’s 24 points, the Tigers got 17 points from Elijah Thomas and 16 points and 9 rebounds by senior forward David Skara.

Trapp finished with 12 points as he made 4-of-8 shots overall, including 2-for-3 behind the three-point line.

Reed tied the game for the Tigers at halftime when he stepped back and knocked down a jump shot right at the foul line with six seconds to play. That tied the score at 33.

Clemson came out on fire to start the game. It made 8 of its first 11 shots to take a 16-2 lead with 14:00 to play in the half. However, the Raiders slowly climbed back in the game thanks to Bill Wampler and Skyelar Potter. The two combined to make 3 of 5 shoots from behind the arc in the opening 20 minutes.

Reed scored 14 first half points for the Tigers on 7 of 13 shooting. Skara scored 8 points, including two baskets from behind the three-point line.

The Tigers now wait to see who they will play in the second round. Clemson improved to 19-16 overall in the NIT and has won 8 of its last 11 games in the tournament.