When he looked up at the scoreboard midway through the second quarter in last week’s win over Wofford, Brent Venables was stunned to see his team so far ahead and the Terriers’ side showing a big goose egg.
“I made a comment that not in my wildest dreams did I think we would be up 35-0,” Clemson’s defensive coordinator said on Tuesday. “I really had no expectation of that whatsoever, and I don’t have that kind of expectation at all this week.”
This week Venables defense will get a truer look at today’s college offenses when the 12th-ranked Tigers host Appalachian State this Saturday in Death Valley. The Mountaineers, led by quarterback Taylor Lamb, are coming off a 49-0 victory over Howard in their season-opener.
Clemson (1-0) shut down Wofford’s triple option attack last week, limiting it to 123 yards and to just 2.7 yards per carry in its 49-10 victory in Death Valley. But Appalachian State will come to Tigertown with an entirely different scheme.
The Mountaineers (1-0) will run power, some isolation plays, and will spread things out with four wide receiver sets. Lamb, who is the son of current Mercer and former Furman head coach Bobby Lamb, was 16 of 21 for 216 yards and three touchdowns in the victory over Howard, while the running game amassed 376 yards.
“They know what they are doing,” Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney said. “When you watch the Lamb kid play, you can tell he is a coach’s son. He is just savvy, has good instincts and knows what he is doing. He knows where everybody else is on the field.
“He just has a great understanding of their scheme.”
Lamb has guided Appalachian State to seven straight victories, dating back to their six-game winning streak to close the 2014 regular season. During this streak, Appalachian State is averaging 42 points per game.
“They are no huddle and temp (offense) that has a good quarterback,” Venables said. “They are a very experienced group that plays with a lot of confidence. They are on a seven-game winning streak so they probably like their match up.
“There are a lot of things from a matchup standpoint that concern you, and we are going to really need to play well. We are going to have to rush the passer, stop the run and play great in the secondary.”
In other words, don’t look for Clemson to run away from Appalachian State and have a big lead by the middle part of the second quarter.
“For our first game, Wofford was a very difficult challenge schematically, especially for a lot of guys who had not played much. We didn’t have many mental errors on defense,” Swinney said. “We have a totally different deal this week from a defensive standpoint but nothing that they haven’t seen. It’s a different type of discipline that we have to play with this week.”