Dabo Swinney isn’t interested in turning Clemson’s opening disaster into a season-long verdict.
After the Tigers were hammered 51-10 by LSU on Saturday, the conversation around Swinney shifted fast, with the worst loss of his tenure bringing fresh heat on the two-time national champion. But on his weekly radio show, Swinney pushed back on the idea that one ugly night should define what comes next, according to The Post and Courier’s Jackson Castellano.
“I just think it’s a terrible mindset to have,” Swinney said. “We’re not going to go undefeated every year.
How many times has that happened in the history of 130 years? And in today’s college football, there’s not going to be many teams that, somewhere, don’t have a loss or have a bad day.
“… We work all year for 12 days, and that’s a bad day. And so you pick yourself up, and you get back in the fight and you learn. Let’s go get better next week.”
There was no sugarcoating what happened in Baton Rouge. Clemson was thoroughly outplayed, finishing with just 145 total yards and one third-down conversion while LSU piled up 644 yards in Lane Kiffin’s debut.
“Certainly not the start we wanted or worked for, or honestly deserved. But we got what we earned,” Swinney said.
“... A lot of unknowns going into the game, but just didn’t do what we needed to do.”
The blowout has raised real questions about where Clemson stands after a 7-6 campaign, especially for a program that spent much of Swinney’s 18-year run as a perennial title contender. For now, though, Swinney is focused on the next chance to respond.
Clemson gets that opportunity Saturday against Georgia Southern, before hosting the UNC Tar Heels on Sept. 19.
“We got 11 more game days, and that one is gone. Nothing we can do about that. Woke up this morning, and hey, the good Lord gave us another day to go chase greatness, and that’s what we’re gonna do.”
In Other News...
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For a team trying to build around a high-profile coach, the off-field noise has quickly become the bigger storyline than the scoreboard. Those developments have cast a shadow over the Tar Heels early success and raised fresh questions about what comes next for Belichick and a program still trying to settle itself. [Read more 🡒]
Michael Malones First UNC Staff Sends A Clear Message About Chapel Hills Future
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It is also a staff that leans hard into the programs own history, with former Tar Heels Brandon Robinson and Deon Thompson working in coaching and development roles. Taken together, the group feels designed to balance continuity with a wider modern reach, giving Malone a staff that knows the building, knows the brand and can still bring in outside perspective as UNC settles into this next phase. [Read more 🡒]