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Clemson

Dabo Swinney shares biggest concern moving forward

Alex Weberby: Alex Weber11/07/22Alexhweber

Clemson walked into South Bend undefeated and in the driver’s seat for a College Football Playoff spot. Several hours later, they boarded a bus back to South Carolina with a 21-point loss to Notre Dame and questions looming at quarterback. Now, the Tigers still have plenty of opportunity to right the ship, win the ACC title and make a strong case for a playoff berth. But the ND loss is a big setback, no doubt.

Head coach Dabo Swinney is itching to move on, though. He’s anxious to see how his players respond to such a moment of adversity. Facing failure doesn’t scare Swinney and he’s eager for the staff and the team to learn from last Saturday and grow stronger moving forward.

At his press conference afterwards, Swinney shared how he puts the loss in perspective.

“You know, just looking at them in the eye on Monday and see where they are. Looking forward to that, just seeing how they respond. That’s how we built this program. And because, you know, you can learn and you grow from it. You got to move forward in competition I mean, it’s just that way at every level, right. Because that’s the best.”

Swinney says that great athletes and teams lose all the time, so there’s no reason to panic on the year quite yet.

“Tom Brady, you know. They lost. He’s the best ever, they’ve lost two games. I mean, it doesn’t matter. I mean, Golden State Warriors have already lost about five games guys. This is it’s hard. It’s hard. And, you know, sometimes you just have days, and especially when you’re a program like Clemson. And you’re gonna get every ounce and everything…and you’re always trying to teach your team. Oh, this is an opportunity for us to hopefully grow. It’s painful, but you know, we’ll teach a new challenge. We will evaluate and we will grow. But it starts with me.”

Dabo Swinney shouldering the brunt of the blame for the loss, knowing that the team’s improvement as a whole is his responsibility. But the Tigers head coach is ready to get right back to work to improve for the rest of the season.