The Clemson Insider has the latest on Clemson’s priority quarterback prospect in the class of 2023.
TCI was in attendance for Sunday’s Elite 11 Regional Atlanta at Carrollton High School and asked Briarwood Christian (Birmingham, Ala.) four-star Christopher Vizzina a couple of questions after the event.
At the same time, we limited what we asked about Clemson because we wanted to give them the opportunity to digest Monday’s visit to Tiger Town. We spoke with Vizizna over the phone Tuesday afternoon and he offered his reaction to his spring practice visit, what he heard from Clemson’s coaching staff and much, much more.
“It was great,” Vizzina said. “I really needed to see a practice and that’s what I’ve been trying to do during these visits I’ve been going to. I needed to see a Clemson practice. It was kind of hard for them to really impress me because I’ve seen everything already. I’m sure it’s hard on their part trying to schedule a visit for me, but I’m still impressed with practice and everything and just how Coach Swinney and everybody coaches.
“It was really fun to watch. I really enjoyed being around the quarterbacks and everything. I really got to pick their minds about Clemson and everything. It was a great experience.”
Vizzina said that he spoke with all of Clemson’s quarterbacks — D.J. Uiagalelei, Cade Klubnik, Hunter Helms and Billy Wiles — but it was Uiagalelei who gave him a lot of good wisdom on how to make an eventual decision.
According to Vizzina, Uiagalelei didn’t really put any “Clemson bias” on how to make a decision and he really appreciated that. Instead, Clemson’s starting quarterback gave him some insight into how he went about ultimately making his respective decision.
Beyond that, he got to see how Brandon Streeter runs his offense and how Clemson’s quarterbacks responded to their offensive coordinator and position coach during Monday’s spring practice.
“I got to sit through their pre-practice meeting and everything before they went out there,” he said. “I liked all the plays that Coach Streeter was calling and all the ones that they were working on. I’m excited to see how that plays out in the spring game and everything.”
As we’ve previously mentioned, some people have told Vizzina that Clemson’s offense won’t prepare him for the NFL. He certainly didn’t feel that was the case when he watched a Streeter-led offense Monday.
“There was a lot of stuff where I was like, ‘Man, that is pro-style, what are these people talking about?'” said Vizzina.
“Coach Streeter showed me a lot,” he added. “Really the visit before this one, he really sat down and showed me how the plays translate to the NFL. I actually got to see these plays run in front of me, the quarterbacks picking up on everything, so I think Coach Streeter’s doing a great job of teaching the offense to everybody and there was a lot of positive feedback from the players about Coach Streeter in his new role.”
Tempo has been a focal point for Clemson’s offense this spring, as Streeter works on adding his own twist to a system that’s being tweaked rather than overhauled.
“I am a fan of it,” Vizzina said. “I think it makes the game a lot of fun. I think it kind of wears down a defense faster, which I think helps you make some bigger plays. At Briarwood, it’s kind of mixed. We kind of change the tempo a lot. You can go slow or you can go super fast. I’m comfortable with both.”
Speaking of comfortability, Vizizna is starting to feel bad for Clemson because he’s been there so many times that they’ve really shown him everything. He was really there for the practice experience if anything, but it also provided him the opportunity to hang out with everybody.
They showed me everything I wanted to see, everything I asked,” he said. “The practice was great like I said.”
The one thing he hadn’t experienced before was getting to sit in one of Clemson’s quarterbacks’ meetings. Vizzina decided against sitting in on a business class, which he previously mentioned that he may do because he thought it would be more important for him to sit in on the aforementioned meeting.
“That was one of the big parts (Monday), being able to watch the quarterbacks learn and how it would be in a quarterback meeting, so that was a good part,” he said.
Vizzina is unsure when he’ll be back at Clemson. Obviously, he’s been to Tiger Town more times than anywhere else. He continued by saying that he probably needs to give some other guys a couple more looks before he wraps up his recruitment.
Vizizna was supposed to visit the University of Georgia this Thursday, but a scheduling conflict seems to have postponed that visit for the time being. Right now, Vizzina is just taking a week-by-week approach, doing what he needs to and getting ready for spring practice, which Briarwood is slated to kick off on Tuesday, May 3.
He did confirm that Streeter will be down in Birmingham to check in on him once next month rolls around.
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