Despite season struggles, Swinney upbeat about Tigers heading into Cheez-It Bowl
When Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney was asked about the state of the Tigers’ program, he gave an unusually short answer.
“It’s as good as it’s ever been,” he said, before being asked to elaborate.
More characteristic, Swinney’s response to the follow-up was much bigger. He went down the list of having “a great, young nucleus of players” along with all of Wednesday’s starting offensive linemen returning for next year; having a healthy group of wide receivers at some point in the future; an ever-improving young quarterback; and an incoming recruiting class that currently ranks 24th in the nation and third in the ACC, among other accolades.
“We just won nine football games and we’re a couple plays away from being in the playoff as well,” Swinney continued. “We lost to a good Georgia team on a pick-six. They’re pretty good. We lost to a really good N.C. State team in September at their place in double overtime. We lost to the ACC champion Pitt that just made a couple more plays than we did, but our team competed every snap all year and never made any excuses and they’re all here.
“If you can’t get excited about that, I don’t know what else there is to be excited about.”
The Tigers have a chance to reach 10 wins for the 11th straight year and end the season on a six-game winning streak against Iowa State in the Cheez-It Bowl on Wednesday. It’s a far cry from the Tigers starting the year 2-2 and losing two ACC games for the first time since 2014.
Even with a 6-2 conference record, Clemson was in play to make the ACC title game until the very end. Objectively speaking, the Tigers had a good year.
Relatively speaking, though, it’s been a down year when considering the program’s 10-year stretch of complete dominance. Where games had previously been decided almost before the first quarter was over, it took the Tigers all four quarters to pull out the majority of their conference wins this season.
Swinney, whose only losing season with the Tigers came in 2010 via a 6-7 record, preached about perspective all season. He said he hoped his team learned about how hard wins are to come by, even if previous groups made it look easy. He never panicked, but used the Tigers ending six-year ACC championship and College Football Playoff appearance streaks as a learning opportunity.
Clemson has had almost a month off for reflection and preparation for Wednesday’s bowl game. Four months ago, no one would have guessed the Tigers would be in the Cheez-It Bowl. The same can be said for where some thought they’d be two months ago, but for different reasons.
Still, Swinney isn’t panicking. For all of the struggles the Tigers have endured, he trusts in his team’s ability to finish out the season on a high note.
“We have a great group of people,” Swinney said. “We have won with people and we’ve still got a great group of people, so we are in a lot better shape today than we were 10 years ago, I can tell you that.”
Prediction: Clemson 20, Iowa State 17
This story was originally published December 29, 2021 at 8:48 AM.
