Playoff Chair breaks down difference between Tigers and Gamecocks, credits Klubnik

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The third College Football Playoff rankings of the 2024 season were released Tuesday evening, and Clemson sits one spot ahead of arch-rival South Carolina at No. 17. One of the reasons is quarterback Cade Klubnik.

Oregon is still in the driver’s seat at No. 1, and the Ducks have already clinched a berth in the Big Ten Championship Game. Oregon was followed by No. 2 Ohio State, No. 3 Texas, No. 4 Penn St., No. 5 Indiana, No. 6 Notre Dame, No. 7 Alabama, No. 8 Miami, No. 9 Ole Miss, and Georgia rounds out the Top 10.

Clemson sits at No. 17 this week, followed by the Gamecocks at No. 18. The Tigers (8-2) and Gamecocks (7-3) will face each other in Clemson in 11 days in the regular season finale for both teams. The Tigers play host to The Citadel this weekend, while South Carolina hosts Wofford.

Clemson went on the road to beat Pitt 24-20 last weekend on Klubnik’s 50-yard touchdown run with under two minutes remaining as the go-ahead score, while South Carolina also scored late in defeating Missouri 34-30 in Williams-Brice Stadium.

TigerNet spoke with Warde Manuel, the Athletic Director at Michigan and Playoff Chair, on a media teleconference Tuesday and asked him why the committee sees Clemson at No. 17 and what separates the Tigers and the Gamecocks.

“Both are coming off wins. The win at Pitt by Clemson and South Carolina’s win over Missouri,” Manuel said. “You can see it. Clemson has lost two games, and they bounced back from that Louisville loss and had back-to-back road wins at Virginia Tech and Pitt. A significant loss to Georgia to begin the season, but they’ve come back.”

Manuel said Klubnik is a big reason for the Tigers’ ranking.

“Cade Klubnik has really controlled the offense and done very well,” he said. “That run to end the game against Pitt was phenomenal. And I just think they are playing good football. As well as South Carolina. As you can see, they are very close. The committee feels that Clemson and South Carolina are very close to each other as it relates to how we see those two teams.”

Manuel went on to say that scoring margin doesn’t matter and that wins carry the most weight.

“Look, we give a lot of credit when teams win, and so we don't penalize teams for winning close or winning too big in other words, but we do value wins,” he said. “We're looking at a lot of variables. We're looking at how the offenses play, how the defenses play, what are the strengths, is there dominance in one half versus another. We are taking a look at the entirety of the game and the performance.

“We will then get together and assess and have conversations about what we saw in the outcome of the game, no matter who wins or loses, and assess then how to rank the teams. The team particular to the question who loses and how that impacts the rankings for next week, that is to be determined. But we don't have any one thing that we look at or one key, but we do look at the entirety of the performance of both teams when we're making our assessment.”

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