Clemson coach Dabo Swinney reacts to controversial call in Wake Forest game
Dabo Swinney jokingly said postgame he’d “plead the fifth” instead of talking about a controversial call in Clemson football’s win against Wake Forest.
But his on-field conversations with the referees after a key roughing-the-passer penalty on Clemson linebacker Jeremiah Trotter Jr. — which featured a lot of yelling and a lot of gesturing and took up the majority of a TV timeout — made his opinions on the play crystal clear.
“I’ll probably get in trouble if I go into all of that,” Swinney said after Saturday’s game.
Five-point win aside, frustration surrounding the penalty on Trotter lingered after Clemson’s 17-12 win over Wake Forest at Memorial Stadium, which moved the team to 4-2 and 2-2 in ACC play heading into its scheduled open week.
Clemson was leading Wake Forest 10-3 midway through the third quarter when the Demon Deacons faced a third-and-14 from Clemson’s 39-yard line.
The Tigers thought they had a stop on a huge play in a one-score game when Wake Forest quarterback Mitch Griffis threw incomplete, until a flag came in afterward that pinned a 15-yard roughing-the-passer penalty on Trotter, Clemson’s star junior linebacker.
Trotter got through the offensive line on a blitz, hit Griffis as he was throwing and drove him to the ground. Clemson thought it had a timely stop; instead, the play gave Wake Forest a fresh set of downs and set up a short field goal to make it 10-6 Clemson.
The Tigers, after holding Wake Forest to a field goal there, ended up outlasting the Demon Deacons after a late onside kick recovery and first down to run out the clock and got back to .500 in ACC play ahead of a looming Oct. 21 game at No. 17 Miami.
Trotter, a preseason all-conference selection, said he felt like his hit was going to be “clean” when he closed in on Griffis and saw he still had the ball in his hand. Trotter said he also decided to hit Griffis no matter what since he was so close to him — otherwise, he said, Griffis may have been able to pump fake and scramble.
“I’m just a player,” Trotter said. “The ref said it was roughing the passer. I gotta keep playing and move on either way. I’ll let the fans have their own opinion on that. But I just kept playing. … It’s making sure that we just keep going no matter what happens.”
Fans at Memorial Stadium booed heavily immediately after the penalty and continued jeering through Clemson’s next offensive possession. Swinney also had heated talks with multiple referees in the TV timeout following that play and Wake Forest’s subsequent field goal.
Swinney, who tied Frank Howard for the most wins in Clemson program history with 165 on Saturday, described the call as a “tough break.”
“We had a couple of tough calls go against us today,” he said. “Sometimes you just have to agree to disagree. It was a tough day in that regard. But I’m proud of them. Again, it just shows growth, shows belief, shows preparation.”
Defensive tackle Ruke Orhorhoro, who also saw a clean hit, said Clemson’s defensive coaches teach players to avoid hitting the opposing quarterback if they see their arm even start to wind up into some type of throwing motion.
“(The refs) always do a good job of trying to protect the quarterback,” Orhorhoro said. “But I really do think he timed that hit really well. They always tell us if you see the motion of his arm don’t even hit him. And so that’s what we usually do. We coach that up.”
Swinney said Wake Forest’s run-pass option offense, which often has its quarterbacks taking a few seconds to read a defender at a “mesh point” and decide whether to hand the ball off to a running back or keep it and drop back to throw, made Saturday’s call even tougher.
“It’s an RPO offense, so it’s a lot of almost jump, pop passes,” Swinney said. “I thought he was just in the air and we caught him there. It’s a very difficult situation as opposed to if you’re dropping back and you finish the guy. So a tough call against us right there.”
As for any other critiques? Swinney laughed.
“I’ll just plead the fifth on it,” he said.
