By Will Vandervort.
By Will Vandervort
CLEMSON — Though he spends most of his time coaching up his defense when the Clemson offense is on the field, defensive coordinator Brent Venables is just as excited as anyone else to see wide receiver Sammy Watkins make his 2012 debut when the 11th-ranked Tigers take on Furman Saturday in Death Valley.
“I’m as happy as Hell,” Venables said. “Are you kidding me?! Hopefully, I will have a little bit of time where I can go watch him play like everyone else who is paying for a ticket to watch him.”
A lot of people seem to be paying for a ticket to watch one of college football’s most exciting players get back on the field after a two-game suspension. As of Friday morning, Clemson officials are expecting a near capacity crowd at Memorial Stadium. Nothing against Furman, but odds are those 10,000 or so fans that have swept up the remaining tickets are not coming to Clemson to see a 0-2 Paladins team.
“It’s exciting to have him back,” Clemson quarterback Tajh Boyd said. “He is one of the more explosive players in college football. He is definitely going to get loose this weekend.”
The question is, just how loose will Watkins get? Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney as well as offensive coordinator Chad Morris said they would like to get Watkins involved in the offense very early and try to get him the football as much as possible.
“He needs to play a little bit,” Swinney said. “That doesn’t mean he has missed any practice or anything, but he needs to get that first game under his belt like his teammates have gotten. We look forward to really having him back out there.”
With Watkins return, it makes one wonder how much better the Tigers will be offensively? So far they have been really good, leading the ACC with 527 yards per game, while averaging 39 points in wins over Auburn and Ball State.
Last year, Watkins became just the third freshman ever to be named a First-Team Associated Press All-American after he totaled 2,288 all-purpose yards, including 1,219 yards and 12 touchdowns at wide receiver.
“It will be easy for us to work him back in,” Boyd said. “Of course it will be a challenge for us because out there on the field, when you have a guy like that out there, you automatically want to get him the ball. But, you are not going to do it in the sense that you are going to force it or anything to that nature.
“For us as an offense, we have to let the game come to us. I think that is what we have been doing the last two weeks. But when you have a guy like Sammy out there, it does change everything because of the presence that he has. But, I’m confident everyone is going to get their touches and everything is going to be distributed evenly. But, it is going to be exciting to have a guy like Sammy back out there.”
It’s also exciting because of the way Watkins has handle his suspension. Boyd said the all-star wideout has been a great example to everyone on the team on how to handle these sorts of ordeals in a positive way.
“It has been fun watching him practice and seeing how he responded to not playing in those two games,” the Clemson quarterback said. “He has worked hard, as if he was going to play. He has been just as encouraging and has been a leader for us from that standpoint.
“I think it shows exactly how much he has grown. That will show when he gets back out there on that field, too. Nobody has really seen it yet, but he is so much more mature as a player from last year and understands more about how the game works. It is going to be fun.”