By Ed McGranahan.

The question bouncing around the press box Saturday night was why – with more than five minutes to play in a game Clemson led by 15 points – quarterback Deshaun Watson did not return to the field.

In his first start in Death Valley he had already broken the Clemson record and tied the ACC record for touchdown passes in a game, and he was 19 yards shy of Tajh Boyd’s record for passing yardage in a game.

Offensive coordinator Chad Morris wanted to pull Watson to protect him from injury because he was confident the game was over, so he approached Dabo Swinney with the suggestion.

So, in a reversal of roles, Cole Stoudt closed out in the 50-35 win over North Carolina notable for Watson’s remarkable debut in Death Valley as a starter. More importantly, though, it created a wistfulness as people began considering what this team could become over the next eight weeks.

Already this season there’s evidence that nobody’s safe in college football. Florida State plays like it’s on a wire without a net. Texas A&M and several others in the polls dodged bullets this week, and South Carolina took one.

With a player of Watson’s skill and composure, Clemson went from being a maybe to perhaps the frontrunner for ACC berth in the Orange Bowl – unless the Seminoles’ wire snaps and the Tigers return to a contender’s role for the Atlantic Division title.

We already knew that North Carolina’s defense was no better than a coffee filter, but think about this for a moment. Watson graduated from high school last December and a year ago practiced this week for a game with some team from Conyers, Ga. Last week he nearly beat Florida State and next week he’ll start a second time for Clemson against N.C. State. In a beating North Carolina he completed 27 of 36 and set a Clemson record with six touchdown passes. The record was tied eight times, six by his predecessor Tajh Boyd.

Watson also passed for 436 yards. Boyd set the Clemson record with 455 in last year’s game with Syracuse. It’s probably safe to guess that record is fragile, too.

After Boyd’s career, it was a stretch to think the numbers he produced could be in jeopardy so soon, but such is the measure of the college game today Watson seems to have the talent and skill ideally suited for Morris’ scheme.

As a passer, he makes all the throws with sufficient acceleration for the smaller windows and an artist’s touch for the precision passes like the 50-yarder to Germone Hopper in the first half.

North Carolina coach Larry Fedora said his team intended to put the game on the freshman quarterback, but by halftime he probably wondered if maybe they should be thinking about Plan B.

“We wanted to stop the run and I thought out guys did a really good job of that,” Fedora said. “We tried to make Watson beat us with his arm.

“He did a nice job taking advantage of that.”

Morris and Swinney insist that at some juncture the run will become a nice complement to the pass, and Watson ran as well as anybody in a Clemson uniform Saturday night which gives them one more weapon once Wayne Gallman and Adam Choice find their niches. And with the stable of young receivers Watson has plenty of options.

For a while there was a joke around North Carolina that the only person able to hold Michael Jordan under 20 points was Dean Smith, his coach.

Morris isn’t going planning to be a punchline for anybody’s joke.

“I’m not going to put a lid on him,” he said. “We’re going to let him
loose.”