By Will Vandervort

The first couple of drives in Saturday’s annual Orange & White Spring Game did not go according to plan for the White team and quarterback Cole Stoudt.

Their first two drives ended in three-and-outs, with Stoudt hitting only two passes for six yards. In six plays they totaled four yards and watched as the Orange team built a 10-0 lead.

But that all changed on the third possession. Facing a second and long, Stoudt dropped back to pass and hit wide receiver Sammy Watkins down the right sideline for 26 yards as he threaded the ball over the top of the cornerback and between the safety. The play got the White’s offense going, and subsequently was the beginning of a record-setting day for the junior from Dublin, OH.

“I hit him good there. It all starts right there,” Stoudt said. “It got my confidence up and we just grew from there. We went down the field, and even though we did not score a touchdown on that drive, we came back on the next drive wanting to score and getting the ball down there and making ourselves better.

“We all just got in a rhythm and it took over from there.”

Stoudt definitely got in a rhythm as he threw touchdown passes on each of the next four possessions. On the last six series of the first half, the White team gained 349 of its 353 total yards. Stoudt was responsible for most of those yards as he completed 16 of 24 passes for a spring game record 304 yards.

“Cole was outstanding,” Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney said.

With the White team trailing 17-0 early in the second quarter, Stoudt found Watkins sneaking by the secondary for a 41-yard touchdown pass. On the next possession, he again found Watkins this time on a 10-yard slant, where Watkins spilt the safeties and turned on the jets for a 50-yard scoring play.

Just like that, the White team was back in the game at 17-14 and Stoudt was beaming with confidence.

“It was a fun day, everything just kind of fell into place,” he said. “We were comfortable. We started out with two three-and-outs and were down (17-0), but we fought back and got the lead, but sadly we lost.

“But hey, we all had fun out there and it was a good day. Both sides of the ball were very productive. We showed signs of some pretty good stuff.”

Stoudt showed he did not have to throw the ball only to Watkins to get his team in the end zone. Stanton Seckinger caught a ball on a wheel route down the right side and then out ran the secondary for a 75-yard touchdown pass to make the score 24-20, Orange, at the time.

On the White team’s very next series, Stoudt hit Adam Humphries across the middle on a post, and the junior receiver turned it into a 51-yard touchdown pass and a 26-24 lead.

“I feel good about Cole,” offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Chad Morris said. “He has had a really good spring. He has got a lot better, but again, he has a long way to go. Tajh Boyd has a long way to go, too, to get to the level that we want to be and play at so we can get this thing going.”

Stoudt, who has been very productive at times this spring, says he is perhaps as ready as he has ever been to come in and play should something ever happen to Boyd. One thing the knee injury to fellow quarterback Chad Kelly taught him and the rest of the team is that they have to be prepared to play because they never know when they’re number is going to be called or when their teammates are going to need them.

“I prepare myself as if I’m going to be the starter,” Stoudt said. “My dad has always told me, ‘Don’t go in there and prepare to be you, prepare to be the starter and the guy for the team.’ I’m preparing myself all through summer and all through workouts like I’m going to be the starter so if the time comes, I can go in and perform.

“Tajh and I have to keep pushing each other. He pushes me, like today when I missed a pass or missed a read he was coaching me. It’s good to have the coaches and the players being able to coach each other out there. It makes the chemistry between each other unique and brings us closer together.”

And that’s thing Stoudt admits hurts the most about Kelly’s injury. He said the freshman was really pushing him and Boyd and was bringing out the best in both of them.

“Competing with him made the both of us and Tajh a lot better. It made us all better,” he said. “Once we did something wrong, we would coach each other up to make us better so that we could be the best that we can be.”