Tough end to a great season. But looking forward to 2020

Jan 14, 2020, 9:24 AM

1st, hats off to LSU. They played a great game can't take that away from them. They were playing in front of a virtual home crowd & were fired up, ready to go. They bet the farm on this being their year & it showed last night.

Really thought our guys had great shot to win. Think if we had not bogged down on what started out as a promising opening drive & instead scored, we could've took crowd out of it early & put more pressure on them. Then failing to take advantage of the short field the next series after forcing 3 & out set the tone for the game - missed opportunities.

I thought Etienne was running good for most part & Galloway had 2 big catches, was really surprised we didn't try to ride them as hot hands & try to get LSU to focus on them to get Higgins & Ross open. Again tip your hat to LSU b/c they did a good job covering our WRs but also TL just seemed off & felt like he was trying to press like he was early in the year. Just sucked we never got rhythm going offensively especially when we needed to.

Defensively - ouch. We did good in the early going but after that, was easily worst showing by a BV defense since the '16 Pitt game. Not having dominant play on the D-line this year was a concern & it showed up bad last night. Being unable to consistently get pressure on Burrows & then letting him escape like he did hurt b/c we needed to rattle him into some mistakes. The staff gambled on the 3-1-7 that we could get to Burrow w/ 3-4 guys & our DBs could win the 1 on 1 matchups & we lost that gamble. Add in the missed/poor tackling, not getting them off the field when we had a chance, & failing to force a turnover (had Turner came up w/ that 1 ball, he'd have been dead sprint to the endzone & we'd be talking about a different ball game), that was recipe for disaster.

Despite what took place last night, I'm still proud of what our coaches & players have accomplished. Our seniors tied last year's Tiger & Alabama teams for most wins by a senior class. We had a 29 game winning streak that was the longest since the 2003-2005 USC Trojans (not Alabama, Ohio State, LSU, Oklahoma, etc - little ol' Clemson did). 5 straight ACC championships, 5 straight CFP berths. And though we lost alot last year w/ the DL and will be losing some key pieces this year (4 of 5 starting OL, 4 starters in the back 7 including Simmons, & potentially ETN) we have the #1 recruiting class in the country coming to Tigertown this offseason.

That's why today, despite last night's disappointment, I was able to put on 1 of my Clemson shirts while getting ready for work b/c like Coach Swinney said - the best is yet to come.

2020 gives Clemson the opportunity to tie the longest win streak against SC. The opportunity to win our 1st game at Notre Dame since 1979. The opportunity to win our 6th ACC championship. The opportunity for our 6th College Football Playoff bid - and the opportunity to play in Pasadena for the 1st time ever or to return to New Orleans and exorcise the demons of our previous postseason trips there. The opportunity to celebrate 125 years of Clemson Football. And the opportunity to end that yearlong celebration climbing to the mountaintop for National Championship #4.

2019's journey ended last night. The journey for the 2020 national championship begins today.

GO TIGERS!

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Tough end to a great season. But looking forward to 2020

Re: Tough end to a great season. But looking forward to 2020

Re: Tough end to a great season. But looking forward to 2020

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