Clemson’s spiraling season makes one thing clear: Change is needed
There’s no bouncing back from this one.
The line in the sand has been drawn a few times during Clemson’s 2025 football season, and rightfully so. But after Saturday’s 35-24 home loss to SMU, there’s no way to look at the Tigers’ 2025 season and view it as anything other than a failure that requires major changes.
Yes, Clemson didn’t have its starting quarterback. Yes, a few other notable players were injured. And yes, the Mustangs are a legitimately good team.
But none of that changes the sobering reality that is a 3-4 and 2-3 ACC record through seven games for coach Dabo Swinney and the Tigers, who continue to position themselves as one of the sport’s biggest flops this season.
Clemson, the preseason No. 4 team in the country, has lost five straight home games to power conference teams for the first time since 1970-71. It is 0-3 against power conference teams with winning records this season. It has been booed off the field at various points in each of its last three home games.
On a weekend that saw No. 2 Miami lose its first ACC game and No. 12 Georgia Tech once again look vulnerable, Clemson essentially shredded any chance it had of being in the mix for the ACC title game by getting outworked by SMU (5-2, 3-0 ACC).
“We didn’t deserve to win the game,” Swinney said Saturday. “Simple as that.”
This isn’t — in any way, shape or form — what a purported year-in, year-out College Football Playoff contender paying tens of millions of dollars to its head coach, its assistants and the top players on its roster should look like.
And it shifts the conversation less from “What changes does Clemson need to make this year?” to “What changes does Clemson need to make long term?”
Even if Clemson wins out, change should come
Even if Clemson were to win out its remaining schedule, finish 8-4 and make a solid bowl game, nobody can or should be satisfied with that result. The fact that a roster this talented has come up so short, and so consistently, demands a reckoning.
Swinney, the winningest coach in Clemson history and a two-time national champion, made some shrewd adjustments for this year’s team. He brought in a career-high three transfer portal players (all of whom have been impactful) and going all in on revenue sharing with the help of an athletic department committing roughly 86% of their pool — over $15 million — to help attract and retain elite players like QB Cade Klubnik, DT Peter Woods and DE T.J. Parker.
The Tigers are right up there with blue bloods such as Georgia, Alabama and Ohio State in spending, paying Swinney one of the highest salaries in the country ($11.25 million in 2025) and about $16 million in additional assistant coach, support staff and administrative salaries, per its most recent NCAA financial report.
And the end result is … a team that cannot play complementary football? A team that hasn’t been above .500 at any point this season? A team that was supposed to contend for a national title and is instead scrapping to stay bowl-eligible?
On Saturday against SMU, Clemson backup quarterback Christopher Vizzina started for Klubnik (ankle) and wound up having one of the best debuts in program history. With 317 passing yards and three touchdowns, he gave the Tigers a chance.
You could say the same for a few other players, too – guys like receiver T.J. Moore (124 yards and two touchdown catches), receiver Tristan Smith (51 yards and a touchdown) and linebacker Sammy Brown (10 tackles, two tackles for loss).
Outside of that, it was a broken record.
Swinney described the lack of a run game (30 carries for 35 yards) as “incredibly disappointing.” If that sounds familiar, it’s because he said essentially the same thing about OC Garrett Riley’s group after the Week 1 home loss to LSU.
Swinney also lamented postgame that “when we needed a stop, we couldn’t get it.” If that sounds familiar, it’s because he said essentially the same thing about DC Tom Allen’s group after the Week 3 road loss at Georgia Tech.
What does starting over in 2026 look like?
Culpability goes past coordinators, of course. When a team with this much talent on paper isn’t playing anywhere close to its potential, some star players aren’t making an impact and other longtime starters appear to be plateauing and/or regressing, it calls into question everything: Offseason preparation. Recruiting. Portal philosophy. Rev share philosophy. Roster construction.
Those sorts of trends — which stretch back to past seasons as well — can make Clemson’s mantra of simply getting back to it on Mondays fall on the deaf ears of fans, who are now paying more than ever to watch the team on Saturdays.
“Just gotta focus on going back to work,” Swinney said, when asked what changes he thought were needed to finish the 2025 season strong. “Watch the tape, and let’s see what we’ve gotta do better fundamentally, technically, playcall, any personnel stuff. ... You just go to the next game. That’s all we can do.”
What about long term? After all, what’s happening to Clemson football in 2025 is worthy of deep conversations, soul-searching and tangible changes.
Should Clemson spend millions on a transfer quarterback who could compete with or flat-out replace Vizzina? Go all in on the portal and bring in seven to 10 guys to provide competition and put underperforming returners on notice? Make staff changes? (Clemson will already be getting a strength and conditioning reset.)
Those sorts of things should all be under consideration. Even the best programs — the ones who have “a lot of credibility,” as Swinney described Clemson on Saturday — need to hit the reset button at times. Just ask Alabama’s Nick Saban.
Swinney commiserated with angry fans, saying he and his team were “disappointed” and “incredibly frustrated” with Clemson’s 3-4 start, just like the fans were. He also openly volunteered Clemson would “win more championships.”
“I promise you that,” Swinney said. “May not happen this year.”
But the word “championships” has a broad definition — it could include, of course, an ACC championship, or even a “state championship,” achieved by winning the annual rivalry game vs. South Carolina. How willing Swinney and Clemson are to truly start over will determine what kind of titles he’s really talking about.
This story was originally published October 19, 2025 at 7:35 AM.
