Heading into his final few months of his college career, [autotag]Joe Gore[/autotag] is one of a handful of seniors on the Clemson roster.

A pair of his classmates left school earlier this year when Kellen Jones transferred to Wisconsin and Isaiah Battle entered the NFL’s supplemental draft. An already small senior class shrunk to 10 before the summer was over.

Attrition happens in college football. It’s not just limited to [autotag]Clemson[/autotag]. But, over the years, the program suffered several early exits from the 2011 and 2012 signing classes — the groups that make up this season’s seniors.

From the vaunted 2011 haul, Shaq Anthony, Tony McNeal, Mike Bellamy, Cortez Davis, Colton Walls, Lateek Townsend and Morgan Roberts all left with multiple years of eligibility remaining.

Patrick De Stefano, Ronald Geohaghan, Oliver Jones and Chad Kelly represent the 2012 signees that ended their Clemson playing days earlier than originally anticipated.

Be it a transfer to greener pastures, career-ending injury, discipline issues — not to mention departures to the NFL — Clemson has a pretty small group of seniors on the 2015 roster.

Because the pool is so small, the seniors have been on the look out for help from the underclassmen.

“Having a class like ours, it’s kind of tough, because everyone looks to us,” Gore said. “But then that’s when we as leaders have to find who else can be leaders on the team, because in a few months we’re going to be gone, and it’s going to be up to somebody else to lead. That’s when we try to bring other guys along.”

Sophomore Deshaun Watson, along with juniors Shaq Lawson, Kevin Dodd and Ben Boulware were named by Gore as underclassmen leaders for this season.

“It doesn’t matter what class, because anybody can lead,” Gore said. “That’s one of our philosophies as a team. If you can lead, lead. Anybody can be a leader. It’s a good thing that we have a small class. It means that it’s preparing some other guys to come up.”

Watson, a soft-spoken guy by nature, could be the most valuable asset among the younger leaders. Given the circumstances of last season’s quarterback situation, it appeared that Watson’s opportunity to assert himself as leader was handcuffed, especially in the early stages of the year.

Gore didn’t see it that way.

“I thought of him as one our leaders last year, because he came out with such confidence and such poise,” he said. “He had respect for everybody. That’s the kind of stuff you want in a guy and look for in a guy.”

For a team in need of new leadership in 2015, it’s awfully nice to have a settled situation at quarterback. And it certainly helps that their guy is regarded as one of the best signal callers in the country.