Jahiem Lawson’s path to becoming a Clemson edge rusher started with a hard no.
As a middle schooler in Central, Lawson had his mind set on basketball. He was a 6-foot-3 power forward at R.C.
Edwards, a kid who could handle the ball and work people over inside, and he was ready to commit fully to hoops. Football, even with his brother Shaq already an All-American defensive end at Clemson and living just 10 minutes from Memorial Stadium, was the sport he wanted to leave behind.
Then Dabo Swinney stepped in.
“I remember very clearly, Jaheim wasn’t going to play football,” the Clemson football coach said in 2024. “He was going to quit, and I told him, no, you’re not going to quit.
He was in middle school, like seventh grade or something. I was like, ‘Have you lost your mind?
You’re going to be like 6-3. You better be Steph Curry, and you’re not.
So you better get your butt out there on that football field.’”
Swinney had seen enough of Lawson around the program to know there was something there. He had coached Shaq Lawson and often hosted Jahiem after D.W. Daniel high football games, and he believed the basketball kid could become a football player - eventually.
That eventually took a while.
Lawson stuck with basketball for a stretch, even as he watched Stephen Curry and Lebron James battle through NBA Finals runs in the 2010s. But the court dream faded, and after a strong high school career at Daniel, he committed to play defensive end for Swinney.
The transition was anything but instant. Lawson arrived at Clemson in 2022 at 215 pounds, a basketball build in a room full of bigger bodies. Teammate Will Heldt described him as someone with a “smile that lights up a room,” but the frame still had a long way to go.
Lawson knew it, too.
“I knew it would be a lot of work,” Lawson said, recalling his first few months in college. “I knew I'd have to be in a Crock-Pot for a while, and I just put my head down and continued to work.”
He spent those early years learning from veterans Xavier Thomas, Miles Murphy and K.J. Henry, all of whom moved on to NFL careers. He added extra “Power Hour” lifts between parks, recreation and tourism classes, and he barely saw the field at first, playing 39 snaps over his first two seasons.
The body changed slowly. Lawson went from 215 to 233 to 241, then reached about 250 pounds before the 2025 season.
Clemson also changed around him. The Tigers brought in Tom Allen as defensive coordinator in 2025 after a rough 2024, and the staff added Heldt, a transfer from Purdue, to start at Lawson’s position. Even so, Swinney saw Lawson turning into the player he had envisioned years earlier.
"I watched (Lawson) his whole life, and he's a high-motor kid," Swinney said. "He's a high-energy kid.
So he's been a developmental guy, and he's got two years left. But I would put him at the top as far as most pleasing guys in camp to this point.
Jahiem, I'm really encouraged with him."
Lawson’s breakout came last season, more than three years after he arrived on campus. In a rotational role, he finished with 6.5 tackles for loss, 3.5 sacks, which ranked third on the team, and three pass breakups. After big plays, he would wag his finger, a little flash of the basketball player he used to be.
The hoops background still shows up in small ways, but Lawson is now being talked about for what he does off the edge. He was named a preseason All-ACC pick ahead of the 2026 season, and with former All-ACC edge rusher T.J. Parker off to the Buffalo Bills, he is positioned to become an every-game starter.
A few years ago, that would have sounded far-fetched. Not now.
“I just know it's my time to step up,” he said in March. “I know I got to be there for the young guys, and I know we need younger guys in our room to help us play. So like I just know I got to do whatever it takes for all those guys in our room whenever it's time for them.”
Lawson and Clemson open the season on Sept. 5 in Baton Rouge, La., against LSU.
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