Clemson Tigers College Football Pregame Quote, 12/26/2018

Was Trevor Lawrence more advanced walking through the door than ‚Äì I mean, Deshaun [Watson] was amazing, so I almost feel like if you start comparing, you end up ‚Äì how advanced was he walking through the door? Both of those guys were ‚Äì you got Deshaun and you were like man, we might not ever see another one like Deshaun, and here comes Trevor. They were very similar coming in the door. I can think back to when Deshaun was there, the first scrimmage in the spring, and he checks and site adjusts and that was something we were trying to get our other quarterbacks to do and it took them a year and a half, and his first string he is figuring it out. Those two young men are very, very exceptional talents, both physically and mentally, and I think that’s why they’re successful the way they are.

What’s the best way to describe that whole process with Kelly [Bryant], arguably won A&M game at the end to a few weeks later he’s gone? It was tough because of who Kelly Bryant is and what he meant to our program and helped to accomplish. At the same time, too, in fairness to our team and to be able to continue to have the coach that we want to have in place, you have to reward production, and that’s really what it was. And happy for Kelly that he’s found him a new opportunity, but at the end of the day, you know, a tough situation for that day. And, you know, we had to rally the troops and we had to move forward.

How does that communicate to the players in general? You say it in the recruiting process. You put it up front. When you say it, you have to be able to prove it. And what we’ve seen over the years, if you’ve seen freshman after freshman that’s the best guy, they’d play. Then Coach [Swinney] does a great job of making them understand that everything in our program is earned. There’s no entitlement, and he communicates it very frankly in team meetings. Christian, you were the guy last year, but you have to be the guy today. You have to be the guy tomorrow. There’s no hierarchy. Every guy has to earn their job every single day.

I don’t think you’d find anyone on your team that would say a bad word about Kelly [Bryant] at this point. Do you think that’s reflective of the culture of how much everybody loved him but he’s not some enemy to you guys, he’s still part of the program? No question, he’s a Clemson Tiger. He’s a Clemson graduate. It hurt to see him go, but everybody respected that he had to make the best decision for him and his future. We went through the process the right way and the numbers spoke for themselves.

That three-week stretch where you go with Trevor [Lawrence], lose Kelly [Bryant], C.J. [Fuller] passes, you have the Syracuse scare, you kind of crammed all your adversity into a couple of weeks. Why do you think you got through that and where you are today? I think the foundation of our program is everything is earned, nothing is given. I think the confidence of our players is in the preparation of the players and how they work. They understand adversity is necessary. Coach [Swinney] says adversity is a companion of a champion and enemy to the weak. They know you have to have adversity to be at your best, be able to grow.

I think they embraced the opportunity, and these guys have a lot of pride. You have a lot of guys that invested a lot in the season and they weren’t going to let any adversity become the excuse. They were going to find a way to get the job done.