CLEMSON FOOTBALL

Gritty Will Shipley says championships are won in camp, where he's moving past mistakes
Clemson's Will Shipley says national championships are won on places like Jervey Meadows.

Gritty Will Shipley says championships are won in camp, where he's moving past mistakes


by - Senior Writer -

CLEMSON – Jervey Meadows on August afternoon isn’t for the faint of heart or the weak. Players who have a full set of pads are soon drenched in sweat, even their socks looking like they’ve been thrown in nearby Lake Hartwell. And running back Will Shipley loves every minute of it.

Why? Because out on a pitted field that’s used mainly for parking motorhomes during the fall is where players bond, where championships are won.

"The grit, it's so gritty out here," Shipley said. "You have the sun on you, man. You're going around. It's tough out there. But that's the best thing about it. This is when you win a national championship. Out here, during these days."

The Weddington (NC) native made an instant impact as a freshman and enters 2022 after a debut season in which he rushed 149 times for 739 yards (5.0 avg.) with 11 touchdowns, caught 16 passes for 116 yards, averaged 27.1 yards on 14 kickoff returns and threw a two-yard touchdown pass in 378 snaps over 10 games (five starts).

However, he missed three games due to injury and missed parts of other games and knows he has work to do to be the best version of Will Shipley he can be.

How good does he want to be?

"Better than last year," Shipley said. "Whether it's off the field, spiritually, on the field catching the football, there's so many different departments that you can improve on every single day. That's what it was for me. Especially being out in the spring, I knew that I had areas to improve. So I focused on those daily. Did the work, kept my head down, and coming out here the best version I've been."

Another change for Shipley is forgetting about the past, including a huge dropped pass at Pitt last season that cost the Tigers a scoring chance. Shipley says he didn’t play well the rest of that game because he couldn’t forget the drop.

"I was just always dwelling on the past," Shipley said. "The one thing I can truly think about is that play against Pitt. I dropped the ball, and literally, the rest of the game, that's all I can think about. That's a huge mistake on my part. I let my teammates down, not only in dropping that pass but not being locked in for the remainder of the game. That's something that can't happen.

“As an elite athlete, I want my teammates to trust me when my number's called. I've got to be ready to go, regardless of what happened in the previous play. I've definitely improved in that sense. You know, just my mental game has gotten so much better this offseason so that's something I wanted to improve on, and I have."

Catching passes is another area in which he wants to improve.

"I want the coaches to have full trust in me to be out there and throw me the football," Shipley said. "Not only that but the quarterback. I want DJ (Uiagalelei) to trust me to go out there and catch the football, whenever it needs to be caught."

“My hands have never truly been a question to me. I think last year, it was more of an attention thing, an adrenaline thing. The moment was sometimes too big for me last year, you know, and I'm not afraid to admit that. I watched a lot of film and it's just me taking my eyes off the ball or being too jittery out there for whatever reason. It's something that comes with experience, age. Me being a sophomore, I can really just feel it today. Everything's a lot slower than last year."

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