Dabo Swinney, Clemson ready for 'heavyweight matchup' with Georgia

CLEMSON — The beginning of college football season starts this weekend with Week Zero, but all the focus is on Labor Day Weekend. That’s when Clemson and Georgia will meet for the 65th time at Bank of America Stadium.

With College GameDay on-site in Charlotte, to go along with the game getting the primetime window on ABC with Kirk Herbstreit on the call, expectations are sky-high for this matchup between the Bulldogs and Tigers.

Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney went on the Packer and Durham Show on Wednesday morning and discussed the monster Week 1 matchup. This is a game that is going to be great for college football.

“These are two great programs,” Swinney told Mark Packer and Wes Durham on the ACC Network. “Over the last decade, these two programs have represented the best of the best. Both teams have been to the playoffs. Both teams have been in national championships. Both teams recruit well. We recruit a lot of the same territory and things like that. Both teams are in the top-five preseason and all that stuff.

“And then it’s Clemson-Georgia. The history of Clemson-Georgia that goes back years and years and years. Fans are excited and always have been. We’ve had a couple of matchups with them, one here and one there, and now we go to a neutral site. So I think people are excited. And then you throw in nobody was at the games last year and people are excited to come and get back in the stands and be able to see some football, and in particular, a game like this of this magnitude.”

A game of magnitude it surely is. Both Clemson and Georgia recruit at an elite level, have top-notch coaching staffs and win a bunch of games every fall. The Tigers have made a bigger splash nationally with six consecutive College Football Playoff appearances, to go along with a pair of national titles. However, Georgia is not far behind, making the playoff or a New Year’s Six bowl for four consecutive seasons, with a runner-up finish in 2017. Kirby Smart is building a juggernaut in Athens.

Now the college football world will get to see these two big brands go head-to-head in what could be a playoff preview in the first week of the season. Labor Day weekend in college football doesn’t get any bigger than this.

“It’s a heavyweight matchup right out of the gate,” said Dabo Swinney.