How much Jake Bentley’s changed since the last time he faced Clemson

It’s hard to remember exactly how new Jake Bentley was to all this the last time he faced Clemson.

He was a freshman in only his sixth start, his second away from Williams-Brice Stadium. He’d had a redshirt stripped off and been handed the keys to an absurdly young offense that had little direction through the first half of the season. Oh, and he was going up against a national championship defense.

That game the staff was bringing him to the sideline between plays, as much to settle him down as to try to slow things. And that didn’t work out all that well.

“It kind of limited the time that I had to kind of pick out what they were doing,” Bentley said. “It was definitely challenging for me, last year, doing that. But, I think this year, I know more.”

He does indeed as he’s got a different grip on the playbook and a level of maturity beyond that of the would-be high school senior forced into college action.

He’s got 12 more games under his belt since throwing for 41 yards and missing the second half with knee issues against the Tigers. This season he has 2,429 yards, 15 touchdowns and nine interceptions, and has also run for six scores.

His coach, Will Muschamp, looked back at that night in Death Valley and said the Bentley he sees now is a world apart.

“I think it’s night and day,” Muschamp said. “It’s No. 1 what we’re putting on him at the line of scrimmage, the amount of different things we’re going to allow him as far as decision making. Much more percentage of the offensive playbook we can carry into a game now. The adjustments we’re able to make at halftime that we probably wouldn’t have been able to do a year ago.”

This story was originally published November 22, 2017 at 3:29 PM with the headline "How much Jake Bentley’s changed since the last time he faced Clemson."