Travis Etienne gives Clemson offensive coordinator Tony Elliott plenty of confidence as a play-caller, knowing that when he calls on No. 9, the Tigers’ star running back is as reliable as they come and more often than not, good things happen when he touches the ball.

With that said, Elliott told reporters this week heading into Saturday’s season opener at Wake Forest that he isn’t overconfident or cocky when it comes to Clemson’s run game or his usage of Etienne. In other words, Elliott says he doesn’t simply assume he can give the rock to Etienne at any time and everything will always go the offense’s way.

“I think that initially on the surface, there’s a lot of confidence,” Elliot said when asked how much confidence Etienne gives him as a play-caller. “But at the same time, too, you respect every opponent. Obviously, we know that we have great players here at Clemson and they’re going to be well prepared, but we also respect our opponent, too, and we don’t take anything for granted.

“So, we have a plan to be able to go in and run the football, and we have an expectation to run the football. But I’m not going to be overconfident from the standpoint of just hand it to 9 and that’s going to solve all our problems. Everybody else has to do their job collectively so that we can all be successful.”

Elliott went on to say Etienne gives him confidence more so in the sense that the All-American and back-to-back ACC Player of the Year has a lot of experience and has been through just about everything on the field heading into his senior season with the Tigers.

“The confidence that I would have is I know that he’s been there,” Elliott said. “So, regardless of the situations, regardless of the environment up at Wake Forest — however it turns out on Saturday night — it won’t be something that overwhelms him.

“So, that’s probably the confidence level that I have, but would never be overconfident and discredit our opponent thinking that we’ll just be able to hand the ball off and that’ll solve all our problems. We’ve got to go earn it on the field, and they’re going to be dead set on trying to stop the run.”

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