Antonio Williams is a special talent, and the stud freshman receiver flashed his potential while making a strong debut Monday night during No. 4 Clemson’s 41-10 win over Georgia Tech in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.
The highly regarded former top-100 national prospect from Dutch Fork High School (Irmo, S.C.) looked as advertised and showed in limited opportunities that he can be a difference-maker for the Tigers’ offense.
Williams made an impact, catching three passes for 29 yards on three targets, and racked up 20 yards after his catches while showing off his shiftiness, quickness and explosiveness in the open field.
“That little Antonio is off to a great start tonight,” head coach Dabo Swinney said following the game.
Swinney says Williams, who had 137 catches for 2,458 yards and 23 touchdowns in his prep career, is very polished already as a wideout — and versatile, as well.
“He’s a great player,” Swinney said. “He’ll play the slot, he can play the outside spot, too. He’ll play a couple spots for us as we go through the year. But he’s a really good player. We’ve seen that all camp.”
Williams, who enrolled at Clemson this summer and drew rave reviews in fall camp, recorded his first career reception on an 8-yard catch and run with 1:08 left in the second quarter.
The 5-foot-11, 190-pounder later had back-to-back grabs toward the end of the third quarter, picking up 7 and 14 yards on the drive that ended with DJ Uiagalelei’s 9-yard touchdown run that put the Tigers up 24-10 with 1:18 remaining in the frame.
Uiagalelei saw Williams make plays throughout fall camp and wasn’t surprised to see him carry that over to his first game action as a Tiger.
“I feel like I’ve seen the same stuff I’ve seen in practice from Antonio,” Uiagalelei said postgame. “He’s done an amazing job this whole summer and fall camp. He’s done a really good job making plays whenever he gets the ball and makes the most of it. I feel like he did the exact same thing tonight. So, it’s exciting to see. I figured that he was exactly going to do that. He said he was a grown man and he showed it tonight.”
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