Dabo Swinney takes responsibility for 'an absolute crap second half' in Georgia loss

Clemson played Georgia tough for a half on Saturday and trailed only 6-0 after two quarters of its season opener. However, the Bulldogs then flexed their muscles over the final 30 minutes.

Clemson was dominated in the second half as the Bulldogs outscored the Tigers 28-3 after intermission. In the end, Georgia earned a 34-3 win.

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Tigers coach Dabo Swinney took full responsibility for the loss and Clemson’s performance after the game, stating that it was his fault the Tigers didn’t play better.

“When you get beat like that, that’s on the head coach. That’s on me,” Dabo Swinney said. That’s just complete ownership of just an absolute crap second half. Really disappointed but have done it long enough. … Sometimes you get your butt kicked like we did today. That’s not what we came here to do, but you’ve gotta give Georgia credit and we’ve gotta move on, gotta learn from it.”

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The Clemson defense played well in the first half, limiting Georgia to only 6 points, but the offense provided just about no help.

Clemson had only 76 yards of offense and had two first downs in the first half. The Tigers defense eventually wore down in the second half as Georgia had 28 points and 287 yards of offense across the final two periods.

“First of all, congrats to Georgia. It was a good first half, tough, hard-fought first half. And then they just freakin’ kicked our tails in the second half,” Swinney said. “So congrats to them. They’ve been a great team. They showed in the third and fourth quarter what it looks like. But just really disappointed.

“And the biggest thing is, when you don’t finish. Again, I’ve talked a lot about it. And I thought we did some good things in the first half. There will be some things on tape. But, you know, you’ve gotta play four quarters. And we didn’t do that.”

Georgia has won two of the past three national titles and clearly looks ready to make some noise again in 2024. There was hope in Clemson that the Tigers would get back to being an elite program this season, but there is some work to do if that is going to happen.