By sitting guys like Dexter Lawrence and Kendall Joseph the last two weeks, plus the return of starters Marcus Edmond and Mark Fields against The Citadel on Saturday, the Clemson defense seems to be as healthy as it has been all year heading into next week’s game against rival South Carolina in Columbia.
Swinney said during his Sunday teleconference with the media he is hopeful about getting everybody back at practice on Monday.
“We have been down in the secondary. We have been down at linebacker and we have been down on the defensive front,” he said. “Hopefully, we are going to have most of, if not, everybody back and ready to go.”
That isn’t good news for the Gamecocks or anyone else second-ranked Clemson has to play going forward.
Despite injuries on the defensive line with Lawrence (ankle), at linebacker with Joseph (knee) and Tre Lamar (shoulder) and in the secondary with Edmond (foot), Fields (foot) and safety Tanner Muse playing with a broken bone in his hand, the Tigers still lead the ACC in total defense (290.2 ypg), rushing defense (116.6), scoring defense (13.9 ppg), sacks (39) and tackles for loss (93). They also rank second in the conference in passing defense (173.6).
In case you are wondering, they rank second in the nation in sacks, third in scoring defense, third in tackles for loss, seventh in total defense, 12th in passing defense and 14th in rushing defense.
In a weird way, Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney feels all the injuries have benefited the Tigers as much as anything else.
“I think we have been able to develop some really quality depth,” he said. “We have some guys that have gotten some great experience across the board defensively and we have obviously held a couple of guys here the last week or so … I’m excited about getting everybody back out there and we will see exactly where we are tomorrow. I anticipate having a really good group.”