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COLUMBIA, S.C. – No. 23 Clemson has arrived to Williams-Brice Stadium for tonight’s rivalry showdown against South Carolina. Check out The Clemson Insider’s photo gallery of the Tigers’ arrival at Williams-Brice: Photo Gallery. Clemson Variety & …
COLUMBIA, S.C. — No. 23 Clemson has arrived to Williams-Brice Stadium for tonight’s rivalry showdown against South Carolina.
Check out The Clemson Insider’s photo gallery of the Tigers’ arrival at Williams-Brice: Photo Gallery.
Clemson Variety & Frame is doing their part to help bring you some classic new barware and help one of the local businesses that helps make Clemson special.
Order your Nick’s barware and do your part to help. #SaveNicks
Dabo Swinney has plenty of fond recollections – and a few bad ones, too – from his experiences as part of games against South Carolina at Williams-Brice Stadium. But Swinney’s best memory came in his first game at Williams-Brice – in 2003, when he …
Dabo Swinney has plenty of fond recollections – and a few bad ones, too – from his experiences as part of games against South Carolina at Williams-Brice Stadium.
But Swinney’s best memory came in his first game at Williams-Brice – in 2003, when he was in his first year as Clemson’s wide receivers coach, and the Tigers throttled the Gamecocks by a score of 63-17.
“I’ve got a lot of good memories – none better than my first one, that’s for sure, in ’03,” Swinney said during his Zoom media availability Wednesday evening. “That was a great memory. I think it was at night. I can’t really remember, to be honest with you.”
Indeed, like this Saturday’s 7:30 p.m. matchup between Clemson (8-3) and South Carolina (6-5) at Williams-Brice, the rivalry affair on Nov. 22, 2003, took place under the lights in Columbia. Charlie Whitehurst threw four touchdown passes, helping a Tommy Bowden-led Tigers team set the record for the most points scored by either team in the series that dates back to 1896.
While that night stands out to Swinney, it’s not the only game at Williams-Brice that he can look back on and smile about.
Clemson’s head coach also recalled the night in Columbia on Nov. 24, 2007, when Tigers kicker Mark Buchholz nailed a 35-yard field goal as time expired to give his team a 23-21 victory. Aaron Kelly had a 12-yard reception from Cullen Harper on fourth-and-4 to extend the eventual game-winning drive.
Two years earlier, in 2005 – a year after The Brawl – Whitehurst finished his career against South Carolina undefeated at 4-0 with a 13-9 win in Columbia. James Davis scored the eventual game-winning touchdown on a 2-yard run with 5:58 remaining, capping a drive during which the Tigers overcame a first-and-35 with the help of a 28-yard pass from Whitehurst to Curtis Baham on third-and-12.
“I remember we made a game-winning kick down there,” Swinney said. “I remember coaching the receivers. We overcame a first-and-35, and we had to hit some big plays. I remember a big fourth-and-4 that we had to convert, and we hit Aaron Kelly on a slant. A great release, technique, and that was a huge play in the game to keep us alive, and then we went on to score. I remember hitting Curtis Baham on a third-and-long one time, on a game-winning drive.”
Swinney was named Clemson’s full-time head coach on Dec. 1, 2008 – a day after the Tigers’ 31-14 victory over the Gamecocks at Death Valley.
After getting the full-time gig, Swinney’s teams lost five in a row to South Carolina – including three in Columbia – but have since won the last six meetings and hope to make it seven in a row over the Gamecocks on Saturday night.
“I’ve got a lot of great memories,” Swinney said, reflecting on his experiences at Williams-Brice. “I’ve got some bad ones, too. So, appreciate you not asking about those.”
Clemson Variety & Frame is doing their part to help bring you some classic new barware and help one of the local businesses that helps make Clemson special.
Order your Nick’s barware and do your part to help. #SaveNicks
You would think playing a noon game at Williams-Brice Stadium might be the time the Clemson Tigers would like to play their bitter rival, if they had a choice. However, that is not the case. Though the home of the South Carolina Gamecocks is a much …
You would think playing a noon game at Williams-Brice Stadium might be the time the Clemson Tigers would like to play their bitter rival, if they had a choice. However, that is not the case.
Though the home of the South Carolina Gamecocks is a much more hostile atmosphere at night, Clemson prefers to play there at night.
“Oh yeah! Oh yeah! Yeah! I am happy the game is at 7:30. I happy,” linebacker James Skalski said.
Why?
“The last time we played there was the noon game. Coach [Dabo] Swinney jokes about it. We got the mild version of the atmosphere kind of because noon games are just different. You want the night games,” Skalski said.
Skalski says he and the Tigers welcome the bad language offered their way in night games. They welcome the Coke bottles, batteries or whatever it is being thrown at them. They welcome “Sandstorm” being played and the little white handkerchiefs being waved in the air.
“As hostile as you can get, we want it that way,” Skalski said. “That is the most enjoyable. That is what it is all about. That is what college football is about. You do not want just half the people there and it is quiet. You want as much energy as possible. You feed off of that as a player. You want that.”
Skalski and the rest of the Tigers are going to get it. Though there are still some tickets available for Saturday’s 7:30 p.m. kick on the SEC Network, South Carolina officials are expecting more than 80,000 fans at Williams-Brice.
“If you are going to be great, you have to love hostility. You have to love it,” the Clemson linebacker said. “I love playing at other places where the fans are into it. It is good going to NC State. I love playing over there because they have a great atmosphere, and the fans are right at your back. Or going to Louisville. You can hear them chirping the whole time. So, I love going on the road. I think it is a lot of fun.”
Skalski hopes the Tigers (8-3) can have as much fun in Columbia as they did the last time they played a night game at Williams-Brice – a 34-10 victory in 2017. Despite the fact the Tigers have won the last three meetings between the two rivals in Columbia, Skalski ranks USC’s home field with some of the best road environments he has played in.
“Oh, it is up there. It’s up there. At that place, they are throwing whatever they can at you. They got the (Sandstorm) playing and the towel swinging, so it is a great place to go play,” he said. “They do a great job over there creating a great environment.”
And Clemson has always done a great job of winning there. Since 1977 – the year of “The Catch” – the Tigers are 16-6 at Williams-Brice Stadium. By the way, Clemson is 7-3 in night games at Williams-Brice.
Now you understand why the Tigers like playing night games there.
Clemson Variety & Frame is doing their part to help bring you some classic new barware and help one of the local businesses that helps make Clemson special.
Order your Nick’s barware and do your part to help. #SaveNicks
