Dabo Swinney not quitting on this Clemson team after upset loss in Week 1

Despite a shocking loss to Duke, Dabo Swinney isn’t giving up on the 2023 Clemson Tigers.

Swinney’s team was a hot pick for a resurgence this season, but their season-opening loss certainly didn’t lend any credibility to that. Now the Tigers are faced with an uphill battle, having to convince the college football world they’re more than pretenders.

Speaking with the media following the loss, Swinney made his call to action, believing Clemson will bounce-back in a big way.

“They held up, and they finished better than we did in the critical plays, that we needed to make. We’ve got to give due credit for that, because again, they might’ve bent a little bit, but they didn’t break until the end. We didn’t finish. Look up, and get beat. Critical, critical mistakes and errors. It’s a gut-wrenching thing. I mean, it is,” said Swinney. “We work so hard with these kids. I love this team though. I mean, I really do. I love this team. I love this staff. We’ve got to stay together, and bounce back. Get back to work. I know a lot of people are probably going to quit on us, and give up on us and throw us away, but man, I ain’t quitting. I ain’t throwing this team away. We’re going to bounce back. We’re going to get better, and learn from it.

“I love the kids in the locker room, and we’ll stay together and we’ll get back to work.”

Thankfully for Clemson, the Tigers will have an easier showdown in Week 2. Charleston Southern is coming to town, and could provide a good opportunity for a tune-up. The Tigers certainly have some issues that need fixing.

Whether Dabo Swinney and Clemson’s struggles were a one-off fluke against Duke, or whether they’ll be extrapolated throughout 2023 remains to be seen, but we’ll find out a ton about his team’s mettle moving forward.

Dabo Swinney: Clemson self-imploded in some key situations vs. Duke

Continuing, the Clemson head coach called the contest vs. the Blue Devils one of the “weirdest” games he’ ever been apart of. That’s likely because the Tigers haven’t lost an ACC game by 21 points or more since 2014, when Georgia Tech beat them 28-6 in the inaugural year of the College Football Playoff. 

So, after the game, a dumbfounded Swinney grasped for answers but could hardly figure out how and why his team committed so many errors. He was asked if the team was surprised by Duke, but said they were’t, noting that they simply missed on a few plays. 

“No, I mean, I didn’t. You know, I was disappointed that we busted on the wheel route twice. You know, that was not anything we had in practice,” said Swinney, also mentioning missed tackles as an issue. “And I was disappointed we missed a couple, I thought, easy tackles early, but nothing that we weren’t prepared for.”

According to Swinney, his team just came apart in moments where they could not afford to do so. 

“So again, it’s not like this is — if you really watch the game, you know what happened in the game, and we self-imploded in some critical situations,” he continued. “And again, you got to finish,” Swinney said. “And it was routine stuff. I mean, the basics, the fundamentals, you know, ball-handling, just some basic basic stuff. Not jumping off side on first and going from the one. You know, basic stuff.”

On3’s Alex Weber contributed to this article.