With just a day left before Clemson opens fall camp, the Tigers are close to turning the page completely on the 2021 season. But Clemson is taking some things with it from that experience into the new campaign.
Clemson pulled off its 11th straight 10-win season last fall. Yet it was perceived by many outside the program as a down year. The Tigers didn’t play for an ACC championship or make the College Football Playoff, the first time they’ve missed out on both since 2014.
It speaks volumes to the different level of expectation the program has risen to during Dabo Swinney’s 14-year tenure, a time during which the Tigers have won a whopping 80.6 % of their games.
“We were about to help him pack. He was about to get fired for only winning 10 games last year,” senior defensive end KJ Henry said jokingly. “But it’s been awesome that that’s the standard we have for this program, that all the success we’ve had over the years has come to a point that now if we win 10 games, that’s unacceptable. I don’t want that to change.”
Because of all of the high-end success, Swinney said the season also gave this year’s team a different perspective and a renewed appreciation for the level at which the program has consistently won during his time at the helm.
Marred by a precipitous dropoff in offensive production, Clemson wasn’t its usual explosive self a season ago, something the Tigers, with second-year starting quarterback D.J. Uiagalelei and first-year offensive coordinator Brandon Streeter, are trying to rectify this year. The blowouts Clemson had grown accustomed to in the ACC in recent years turned into white-knucklers as the Tigers used the help of the league’s top defense to eek out five one-possession victories.
A rash of injuries didn’t help matters. It all made for the first bout of what Swinney called “football adversity” that his program had to deal with in years.
“We’ve had disappointment,” Swinney said. “Losing a national championship or a playoff game, that’s not adversity. That’s disappointing. But I wouldn’t call that football adversity. Football adversity is what we dealt with last year. You sit there and you’re 4-3, and you’ve got a lot of challenges. There are a lot of things. How are you going to respond?”
Clemson rattled off six consecutive wins after its final loss at Pittsburgh in late October, capping its latest double-digit win season with a seven-point win over Iowa State in the Cheez-It Bowl.
“We took that very seriously,” Henry said. “We were glad to get the win in the Cheez-It Bowl.”
The postgame celebration in Orlando was a lively one. Swinney said it was “as good of a locker room as I’ve ever been in,” which says a lot considering he’s coached Clemson to seven ACC titles, six College Football Playoff wins and a pair of national championships.
With more than half of their starters back on both sides of the ball, the Tigers’ goal is to get back to celebrating conference titles and playoff victories. But last season served as a stark reminder that Swinney and his team aren’t entitled to anything.
“This group, they have incredible leadership and a lot of veteran experience,” Swinney said. “A lot of guys that have been part of a bunch of championships. And now they’ve got a little bit of perspective to go with it.”
Dear Old Clemson has added to the store posters signed by all 20 members of Clemson’s 2022 football class.
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