Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney made it clear in his postgame press conference what he thought of his quarterback D.J. Uiagalelei’s performance Friday night during the Tigers’ 17-14 win over Syracuse in the Carrier Dome.
“I thought he played his best game,” Swinney said. “What are we, 4-2? So, of our six games, that’s the best game he’s played.”
The sophomore signal-caller completed 21-of-34 passes for 181 yards with one touchdown and no interceptions. His 21 completions were a season high.
Uiagalelei’s longest pass went for 23 yards to Beaux Collins in the fourth quarter on the drive that ended in a B.T. Potter field goal, which put Clemson (4-2, 3-1 ACC) up 17-7 with 9: 22 left in the game.
Uiagalelei’s second-longest completion was his 19-yard touchdown pass to Joseph Ngata in the second quarter, while he had six other completions of 10-plus yards in the contest (15, 15, 13, 12, 11, 11).
Swinney could only recall a couple of throws that he believes Uiagalelei missed, adding that his receivers didn’t always help him out as there were some drops.
“He put some huge plays together,” Swinney said. “Again, some missed opportunities. Some very accurate throws. I can think of two that he missed. He kind of came up short on an RPO (run-pass option) hitch, and then he had one shot ball that he overthrew. But other than that, he put the ball on the money – we just didn’t make enough plays for him that were there. So, I thought he played his best game. … Him doing his job, he played his best game tonight.”
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