CLEMSON — Dabo Swinney said he was lucky to get out alive during South Carolina’s postgame celebration Saturday at Memorial Stadium.

With thousands of Clemson and South Carolina fans on the field, players from both teams nearly got into an altercation as Gamecock players attempted to plant a Gamecock flag in the middle of the Tiger Paw on Frank Howard Field.

“It was dangerous. It was scary,” Swinney said Sunday during the coaches’ Zoom call to preview next week’s ACC Championship Game against SMU. “We got to make sure that does not happen anymore. And we can’t be hypocrites either.”

The Clemson coach admitted he was not aware until after it happened that one of his players stuck a flag into the Gamecock’ logo in Columbia following the Tigers’ win in 2023. The player was retaliating after South Carolina players did the same thing following their win at Clemson in 2022.

“Obviously, I have not been a part of much of that, but that was something that happened a couple of years ago and then last year we went down there and we had a player go plant a flag. I did not know about that until after it happened,” Swinney said. “I am disappointed about that, and then again this year that seems to be a thing. Listen, that just should not happen.

Swinney says he plans to address the matter with South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer to make sure this does not happen after future games.

“Shane and I, we will talk about that and we will make sure that does not happen moving forward. That is dangerous and people could have gotten hurt,” Swinney said. “It could have been a bad situation. I know you saw a lot worse at other places for the same thing, but Shane and I both have to do a better job in that and we will.”

It has been worse and luckily no one was seriously hurt then as well. In 2004, both teams got into a brawl at Memorial Stadium, which took more than 20 minutes to clean up.

As punishment, both programs agreed not to participate in a bowl game, though they were both bowl eligible.

“I promise you, if we win down there next year or whenever we win down there again, that is not something we are going to do. I am going to make sure of that,” Swinney said. “You win, you have bragging rights and you certainly want to celebrate that, as you should, but it just can’t happen. It really could have gotten out of hand yesterday. There were a lot of people down there and I think we can all be better there.”

Clemson and South Carolina were not the only teams that got into it on Saturday. Alabama-Auburn had a couple of scuffles in the Iron Bowl. North Carolina and NC State players got into it, as did Florida and Florida State.

The worst incident happened after the Ohio State-Michigan game were police used pepper spray to break up the melee. A reporter got sprayed while trying to film the incident.

“We are in that too because I know that we had a player do that last year down there,” Swinney said about planting the flag. “It is not something we really need to be involved in. Lets win the game, lets celebrate with our team, go shake hands and lets move on. That is what we need to do.

“There is a lot. Everybody across college football can learn from yesterday because that was a bad look for college football.”