Clemson heads to Austin next week to face off with Texas in the first round of the College Football Playoff, and a place Dabo Swinney has fond memories of.

When Swinney was named the Tigers’ head football coach following his interim stint in the 2008 season, he wanted to pick the brain of some fellow head coaches. However, when he reached out, he wasn’t having much luck.

Only one head coach was open to Swinney visiting. That was Mack Brown, who at the time, was head coach at Texas.

“I actually called around to a lot of coaches, and the only guy that would let me come visit was Mack Brown,” Swinney said on a Sunday Zoom call. “And he didn’t know me.”

“So I brought my whole staff; strength staff, defense, offense and we went out and spent two and a half, three days there.”

It was a trip that paid off and in a big way.

“That trip was life-changing for me,” Swinney said. “I got the job as the interim in the middle of the season and got the job in December. Now you’re getting going, putting your staff together, we signed our first class; 12 guys. I was just looking to go learn. I didn’t know much about being a head coach other than what I had done as an interim and what I thought. I had a lot of thoughts in my head. I just felt like I needed to go learn.”

“I was hoping I might get maybe an hour with him. He spent several hours with me one-on-one, and I had a lot of questions. Some of it was just confirmation, ‘Ok, I’m not crazy, I’m thinking the right way.’ A lot of it, I couldn’t even get the question out of my mouth, he could read my mind and he had the answer.”

Swinney would go on to face off against Brown three times. All three came after Brown had left Texas and went back to North Carolina, with Clemson going 3-0 in those games, including a blowout win in the 2022 ACC Championship Game.

Clemson and Texas have never met on the gridiron so this game gives Swinney an opportunity to play in Austin for the very first time. And it’s a trip that will represent a full-circle moment for the Tigers’ head coach.

“As a young coach, 39 years old, it was transformational that he took the time to pour into me,” Swinney said. “He didn’t have to. It gave me maybe a different way to think about a few things, as well. He went way above and beyond. I’ve still got my notes, about seven or eight pages of notes that I took that really helped me when I got back to Clemson, as far as being a head coach, having some confidence in what I thought we needed to do moving forward.”

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