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The Clemson Tigers and head coach Dabo Swinney are having a no good, very bad start to the 2023 college football season.
The Tigers sit at 4-3, their worst start to a season since 2010. They went on to finish that season with a 6-7 record, the lone losing season of Swinney’s career.
Now, after Saturday’s double overtime loss to the Miami Hurricanes, it sounds like Swinney needs to find himself an accountabilibuddy.
Clemson had the ball at the 1-yard line in the second half of double overtime against the ‘Canes needed a touchdown and a two-point conversion to tie the game.
Instead, sophomore quarterback Cade Klubnik faked a hand off before running to his left and getting tackled for a loss to end the game.
What exactly went wrong on the play?
Well, Swinney is pointing the finger at Klubnik for the failure.
“No, it was a handoff, 100% and we didn’t hand it off,” Swinney told 247Sports after the game. “[Klubnik] just pulled it. I’ve got no answer. I mean, just trying to do too much.”
To be fair to Swinney, Klubnik did admit as much after the game.
Klubnik confirmed the play call to reporters after the game, noting that he would “hand it off 10 times out of 10” if he had the play back again.
But still. That’s a spot as a head coach where you just have to wear one for your 20-year-old quarterback with fewer than 20 career starts.
And plus, it didn’t look like a hand off to running back Will Shipley was going to result in a touchdown either way. So the play call still stunk.
It’s a bold stance from a coach who seems to be trending in the wrong direction.
But hey, maybe he was just trying to bring Clemson fans back down earth a little bit. So things worked out okay in the end.