Kelly Bryant was in meetings Tuesday. Then he broke the news to Dabo hours later

Dabo Swinney met with the media Tuesday morning and said he expected senior quarterback Kelly Bryant to play Saturday afternoon against Syracuse.

“I don’t have any doubt he’ll be right here and ready to go,” Swinney said.

Less than 24 hours later Swinney confirmed that Bryant was transferring from the program when speaking on the ACC teleconference Wednesday morning.

“Obviously saddened and disappointed that he’s chosen to leave the team, but I really have absolutely nothing bad that I can say about Kelly Bryant,” Swinney said. “He’s one of the best young people that I’ve ever been around. Even though I don’t think this was a great decision, I certainly respect it.”

So what happened on Tuesday that led to Bryant transferring? Swinney shed some light on the situation Wednesday evening.

“He was in the team meeting and the quarterback meetings and then he just didn’t come out to practice,” Swinney said.

Bryant and Swinney had a meeting on Monday to discuss the coaching staff’s decision to turn to Trevor Lawrence as the Tigers’ starting quarterback.

Swinney admitted Wednesday that the possibility of Bryant transferring was brought up during the initial meeting on Monday, but he thought that Bryant was still weighing his decision when the senior showed up for meetings the next day.

When Bryant did not come out for practice after meetings on Tuesday, marking the second consecutive day that Bryant missed practice, Swinney was afraid that something was wrong.

Swinney sent someone to contact Bryant’s family and make sure he was OK and learned that Bryant had left to go home.

When Swinney walked off the practice field Tuesday night and checked his phone he had a message from Bryant.

“He just sent me a nice text just saying ‘I’m sorry,’ but this is what he was going to do and he appreciated his opportunity and proud of his degree and all that but this was his decision,” Swinney said. “So that’s it. I told him, ‘You’ve got until 10:50 a.m. tomorrow because I’m on the clock at 10:50 a.m. I’m going to have to confirm it one way or the other (on the ACC teleconference).’ So that’s how it went.”

The Tigers continued preparation for Syracuse on Wednesday, practicing without Bryant for the third consecutive day and for the first time since he officially announced he was transferring.

While Bryant does have plenty of close friends on the team, preparation for the Orange has to continue.

“We’ve gotta move on ... We’ve gotta move forward,” Swinney said. “We’re definitely not a better team without him. But it’s kinda like somebody having a season-ending injury. Somebody’s gotta kind of step up and rally the troops. You’ve got what you’ve got and you go back to work.”

This story was originally published September 27, 2018 at 6:21 AM.