On Monday night, Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney had a fan on his weekly radio call-in show who admitted she’s been panicking about the Tigers and the direction the program is heading.
This caller is worried the Tigers have “fallen from the ranks of the elite,” with a return looking unlikely. Asking Swinney if she can be confident that the Tigers are fine and what the plan is for the program, the head coach had this to say.
“I’ll give you plenty of confidence,” Swinney responded. “Let’s see here. There’s only three teams in America that have two national championships in the last seven years, and we’re one of them. There’s a lot of these teams that I guess a lot of people praise them — they need to find a way to win one, much less two. And we’re the same people that won those two. We went 35 years here without sniffing one. We’ve won two in seven years and played for a couple more, and we didn’t all of a sudden get stupid.”
Swinney has always been a positive mindset guy, so a response like this is no surprise. The interesting thing is Swinney believes Clemson is just getting started.
When it comes to all the noise around the program from the media, Swinney doesn’t believe she or any other fans should be listening to “that mess.” This team is no stranger to doubters, and what has Clemson done before? Proved them wrong.
“Those are the same people that said we’d never win one, certainly with me as the head coach. So, I wouldn’t listen to any of that stuff,” Swinney said. “I don’t read anything, I don’t listen to any of that stuff, so I would encourage you to do the same and stay positive. You have every reason to listen to somebody who’s done it as opposed to somebody who’s sitting around talking about it and telling you that we can’t do it. And we can do it. We have done it, and we will do it again. But it’s hard. We’ve won three in 128 years. Most schools ain’t ever won one. So, it’s really hard.”
When you reach the success levels the Tigers have, the reality that you can’t win it all every season can be tough. No matter the team or the program, you are going to hit your rough patches. For Swinney, it is about enjoying the good and hanging in during the bad.
“Enjoy the great times and hang in there in the tough times, and in the end, you’re going to look back and you’re going to be like, ‘You know what man, this was a great journey, great ride.’ So, that’s the best advice I can give you,” Swinney said.
“We’ve got great people and a really talented roster. If you listen to all the other stuff out there, you’ll probably think we’re never going to win another game. But we didn’t get here by being stupid. So, we’ll be alright. I promise you. I don’t know if that helps you or not, but I’d just say hang in there, keep the faith.”
It’s all about keeping faith.