Clemson plays for the state championship next Saturday, but head coach Dabo Swinney took a little time Sunday evening to recap the Tigers’ 31-20 Saturday victory over North Carolina. That includes a play by cornerback Nate Wiggins that Swinney says will be shown for years.
Clemson (7-4) plays at South Carolina (5-6) at 7:30 pm Saturday (SEC Network) in Williams-Brice Stadium. The Gamecocks broke a long losing streak to Clemson with a 31-30 victory last season.
I’m really proud of our team and super happy for our seniors. It was a very competitive game. Both teams battled really hard,” Swinney said on his Sunday night media call. “We played with great effort but made plenty of mistakes, too. The good news is we overcame them. The takeaways were huge. Winning that turnover margin is huge for us. It was a really good team effort and in all three phases.
Getting ready for the next one, a big one, the state championship … we’re diving into those guys right now (on film study). We’ll see if we can keep our momentum going. Our guys have battled all year long.”
Swinney said the status of wide receiver Beaux Collins is unknown.
“Pretty good except for Beaux, who will be day to day,” Swinney said of Clemson’s injuries. “We’ll see how sore he is. Hopefully that will go away quick. He was probably the biggest one. Everyone else, I think we’re in good shape.”
Wiggins chased down UNC running back Omarion Hampton and stripped him of the ball just before Hampton crossed the goal line, and Swinney said he was still in awe.
“Oh sure. I’ll be talking about that for the rest of my career. It was incredible,” Swinney said. “That kid can absolutely fly. There are a lot of people who are fast, but there are others who are as fast as they need to be. And Andrew Mukuba‘s effort on the play was amazing as well. He dives out and just clips his heel, and that little bit of a clip allowed Nate more time to get there. Nate was at a little more than 22 miles an hour, just smoking. It was one of the greatest plays I’ve seen. It was such a momentum play, too. And we’ve been on the other side of that this year, too, as y’all know. I’ve been on both sides of it. Boom, right afterward, we go on an 80-yard touchdown drive. I think he was our second leading tackler behind Jeremiah Trotter. A lot of big plays from Nate. It’s probably the best game of his career.”
They’re battling. They’re competing. It’s a play here or there where maybe we stay on the double-team too long. Just some leakage on protection. But they played well. No sacks. And we got that run game going. We had some great, great, blocks. There were more pluses than minuses, and that’s always what you want to see. We had a couple of penalties, and that was the biggest disappointment. We had a couple of technique and fundamental things that got us. All in all they did a heck of a job, and our guys ran really hard behind them. They all battled. I think we played seven guys.”
On if Cade Klubnik was more confident running the ball
“No doubt about it. That was huge. They were playing aggressive, coming off the edge. He did a good job with his decision-making and ran with good vision. He still looks like a baby deer running around out there. He’ll continue to fill out and maybe add another 10 pounds or so. You’ll see that part of his game improve, and he has already improved greatly from where he was when the season started. I was really proud of him. He made some big plays. He showed good poise. He had a couple of gritty yards. Big day for him as well with his legs.”
More missed tackles and missed fits. We had two guys in the same gap on one. We had a couple where he just broke the tackle. I mean he’s a great player. He’s really good. These guys have seen some good backs. I just did not think we were consistent enough. We did a good job in the red zone, but we have to be more consistent with doing some of the little things. We have to be disciplined in doing our job. And we have to make open-field tackles. We’ve done a good job of that, but we missed too many tackles yesterday.”
On if Avieon Terrell is more advanced that AJ Terrell was at the same point
“Maybe just because of his brother. He has had such a great model to watch, a guy who is a first-round draft pick. He has been exposed to so much. And A.J. was elite when he got here. We knew he was special. He was always about his business. I would say Avieon has benefited from his brother and the exposure to the game and the specifics of his position. And he is a hard worker. He is a grinder. I saw him in camp, and he was in the ninth grade, and we put him up with the seniors, and even then, he was locking them all down. He was one of those few that we offered really early. I’ve known him since he was in about the sixth or seventh grade. I am really proud of him.”
