By Will Vandervort.

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass — In the week leading up to Clemson’s game at Boston College, all the Tigers’ defense heard about was how good Boston College quarterback Tyler Murphy is.

And he is, but he wasn’t on Saturday and he wasn’t against No. 22 Clemson. Though the graduate threw two touchdown passes, the Tigers held the ACC’s top-rushing quarterback to 55 rushing yards and 109 passing yards during their 17-13 victory at Alumni Stadium.

So how did Clemson (5-2, 4-1 ACC) shutdown the most elusive quarterback in the ACC when no one else has been able to?

“We are fast and we got guys that can run on defense at every position,” Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney said. “We are a fast defense and for the most part very disciplined in playing our gaps and we play our gaps. That’s what they force you do to with what they are doing.

“As I said coming into this game, it is almost like they run the triple option out of a spread attack and he is a weapon.”

Boston College (4-3, 3-2) tried to use its weapons all day, but the Tigers contained Murphy when no one else has been close. Before Saturday, only Colorado State held him less than 90 yards rushing and that was 79 yards. He was averaging 118.7 yards a game on the ground coming in and had scored a rushing touchdown in every game.

But Clemson held him out of the end zone and sacked him five times. He had just four rushing yards on 11 carries prior to getting scrambles of 43 and 8 yards on the Eagles’ last drive.

“He is just really a hard guy to get down,” Clemson defensive tackle Grady Jarrett said. “He got out a couple of times and slipped out of a couple of tackles. We knew they wanted to run the ball. They were fourth in the nation running the ball.

“We had to win the battle up front. It was really a rough game for the guys in the trenches and we did enough to get the job done.”

Clemson ran a lot of blitzes and at times kept a spy on Murphy to keep him contained. That forced someone else to have to step up and win the game for BC and no one else did. The Tigers held Boston College to 263 yards and 2 of 14 on third downs.

The Eagles had just 120 yards rushing and averaged just 3.3 yards per carry after coming into the game averaging 315.7 yards a game, which ranked fourth in the country.

Clemson also recorded 14 tackles for loss overall, while Murphy completed only 9 of 18 passes.

“We prepared all week to play against him,” linebacker Tony Steward said. “We know it is not just him, but he is the heart and soul of their offense and as long as we held him to a manageable game then we knew we had a chance of beating a very good team.”

And that’s what they did.

“If they had been able to run the ball effectively on us, it could have been a long night for us, but our guys were able to stop the run,” Swinney said.