Before he went on to have an historic career at Clemson, C.J. Spiller’s journey to Tiger Town started with a business card back when he was going through the recruiting process as a five-star prospect in the 2006 class from Union County High School in Lake Butler, Fla.

In a recent interview with former Clemson running back Darien Rencher on The Players Club Podcast, Spiller reflected on how he ended up becoming a Tiger and the business card that Dabo Swinney made him sign to ensure he followed through on his promise to give Clemson an official visit.

“Honestly, the story is I had five official visits, that is very normal for a prospect coming out of high school,” said Spiller, who was ranked as the nation’s No. 1 all-purpose back coming out of high school. “And ironically, my high school coach, Andrew Zow, he attended the University of Alabama. So, we always had that communication, and I just called him one day because I was getting ready to set up my visits. I was like, ‘Hey, man, do you think Alabama, what’s their deal? Are they going to recruit me, are they really trying to get me or are they just playing the fence?’ So, he reached out to the people over at Alabama and kind of got some inside information for me. And he got back to me and was like, ‘Hey, they’re recruiting, but they ain’t really feeling you.’

“And my high school teammate Kevin Alexander, he was already committed to Clemson. So, I always saw Coach Swinney when he came through, and Kevin always talked about Clemson. So, I was like, all right, I’ve got one visit. I was like, I’ll just go to Clemson. And ironically, Coach, I guess he thought I was joking around. So he made me sign like this little coach’s card, business card, if you want to call it – that hey, I will attend Clemson on an official visit on such and such date. So, I had to sign it. One of my teammates had to sign it, and Coach signed it, because I guess he was just in shock that a kid of my caliber would take a visit to Clemson. But I just felt like hey, if my teammate’s committed, there must be something special about this place. So, what’s the worst-case scenario? If I don’t like it, I still have some other schools to choose from that’s top notch.”

Spiller, of course, stayed true to his word and took the official visit to Clemson – and the rest is history.

“I just came up here on a visit, honestly, and it was after I had got done with my University of Florida visit,” he recalled. “It was the only visit where I called back home and told my mom, ‘Hey, I think this is a place I could be for three or four years.’ I had been down to Miami, I had been out to the real USC out in Southern Cal, I was coming from Florida. I still had my Florida State visit, but everybody knew I grew up an FSU fan, so I stayed in Tallahassee more than I stayed in Gainesville for games and stuff like that. So, I knew a lot about that program, but I would still go take a visit.

“So, I just came up here, and it was just something different… And then I just remember James Davis and Jacoby Ford staying back. Matter of fact, it was Martin Luther King weekend, because the university was out for the holiday, and those guys stayed back and hosted me on my visit. We kind of just chilled right there in the old Thornhill where the players used to stay at, and they had a little house party.”

After Spiller signed with Clemson in February 2006, he became one of the most exciting players in college football history from 2006-09, recording 21 career touchdowns covering at least 50 yards and scoring an ACC-record eight kick returns for touchdowns in his career. He still holds ACC single-season and career records for all-purpose yards, posting 2,680 in 2009 and finishing his career with 7,588, which was second-most in FBS history at the time of his graduation.

His time as a Tiger culminated with a senior season in 2009 in which he finished sixth in Heisman Trophy voting after winning ACC Player of the Year and being selected as a unanimous first-team All-American. He became the first player in the history of the Walter Camp All-America team to be first or second-team All-American at two positions in the same year.

And it all began with that business card.

“If you go in his office, he still has that little card on his office to the day,” Spiller said of Swinney. “He literally made me sign that card, just because a lot of people didn’t really think that I would come on a visit, honestly. I don’t know what it was that made people think that, but I always was raised, if you give somebody your word, you stick to it and I had given coach my word that I would come on my visit because I knew what I was looking for. I wasn’t trying to go see every place. I had honed in on what I was looking for in the college decision.”

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