This national college football analyst spoke plenty about Dabo Swinney’s program following Clemson’s 35-14 loss to Notre Dame last Saturday, and most of what he had to say wasn’t positive.
Fox Sports’ Joel Klatt believes the Tigers have taken a clear step down from what they were when they beat Alabama to win the 2016 and 2018 national titles.
“I don’t quite feel as confident about Clemson,” Klatt said on The Joel Klatt Show. “Why is that? Well people are like, ‘You are a Clemson hater.’ Nope. Not at all. Absolutely not. In fact, I thought Clemson was on one of the more historic runs, it just happened to coincide with a Bama run. But the Clemson run that we saw over those few years with Deshaun Watson and Trevor Lawrence, that was as good a run in college football as we’ve seen in a long time, and it’s incredibly hard to sustain that. And I do think that Clemson has clearly fallen down a little bit from what they were when they were winning those national championships in that heyday run against Alabama it seemed like every other year.”
Klatt says he’s “concerned” because of the teams Clemson has lost to lately, as opposed to those who have come away with wins over Alabama recently, like Tennessee and LSU this season on a last-second field goal and two-point conversion in overtime, respectively.
“I’m concerned because the teams that they’re losing to and the teams that are playing them close,” he said. “It doesn’t take those hundred thousand-seat environments and a kick that barely goes in. Like, it doesn’t take that. It doesn’t take the two-point conversion in the first overtime from a good LSU team.
“I mean, look at their last three losses when you look at Clemson. They lost at Notre Dame, who lost to Stanford and Marshall in that stadium this season. They lost to Pitt. They lost to North Carolina State. Those are the last three losses for the Clemson Tigers. Doesn’t that ring a little bit different than Bama’s three losses? At LSU, at Tennessee and Georgia in the natty, right. Like, rings a little bit different. By the way, they lose to Notre Dame, and they played one-possession games in wins against Syracuse, Florida State and Wake, right. Like, it’s different.”
Klatt added, “You’ve got to be playing at the top end of college football to play with or even try to beat Alabama. That’s not the case with this Clemson team.”
He then asserted that Clemson is a “good” program but “not elite” right now, pointing to the Tigers’ play at quarterback and on the offensive line.
“They are not good enough right now on the offensive line and they’re not good enough at quarterback, and the numbers bear that out, the data bears it out,” he said. “Clemson’s offensive line is not playing very well, over the course of the last two years. When you look at this year, they’re 54th in yards per carry in the country. That’s not good enough. Last year, they were 56th in yards per carry. So, they’re not even in the top 50 in yards per carry. You cannot be that and be elite. I totally disagree with the notion that you can be a non-running team and be an elite college football program, because that’s what we’re comparing them against – not if they’re good.
“Yeah, Clemson’s good, they’re not elite right now. So, they’ve clearly fallen down a step from where they were.”
Klatt went on to talk about Clemson’s quarterback situation, specifically DJ Uiagalelei getting replaced by Cade Klubnik with the Tigers trailing in the second half of each of their last two games against Syracuse and Notre Dame.
“Their quarterback situation, unsettled,” he said. “I had people take off on me on Twitter, like how could you call their quarterback situation unsettled? Well, they continue to pull their quarterback in order to try to come back from deficits against teams that I don’t think are very good, and it didn’t work on Saturday night. By the way, that game wasn’t particularly close, and that’s a Notre Dame team that’s totally one-dimensional, cannot throw the football very well and ran it effectively against a Clemson defensive front that we thought was the strength of their team.
“Clemson has clearly fallen down a notch from where they were at, at the heyday of their run under Dabo Swinney.”
“Clemson is good, they’re not elite.” 👀@joelklatt critiques the way we should look at Clemson ⬇️
— FOX College Football (@CFBONFOX) November 8, 2022
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