ESPN college football studio host and commentator Matt Barrie joined Clemson alums Kelly Gramlich and Eric Mac Lain on the Gramlich & Mac Lain show’s Summer Guest Series.

Barrie, who joined ESPN in March 2013, gave some thoughts on various teams in the ACC, including Clemson.

Barrie believes Clemson is one of the nation’s elite teams entering the 2025 season, coming off a 2024 campaign that saw Dabo Swinney’s squad capture the ACC Championship and make the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff.

Barrie says this is the year Swinney and company have been “waiting for,” with the Tigers returning quarterback Cade Klubnik and a host of other stars on both sides of the ball.

“I would put Clemson up there among the top 3-5 teams in the country. This is the year that they’ve been waiting for, for a couple of reasons,” Barrie said. “Cade Klubnik came out, he was the No. 1-ranked dual-threat quarterback in the country. He was the popular guy when (DJ Uiagalelei) was struggling, came in, gave them a little burst, but then he kind of started slow. Now he’s there, he’s been there, he gets it. This is the team that gets Clemson back into the conversation that we had when they had Trevor Lawrence and Deshaun Watson. They were the team to beat coming in.”

Of course, Swinney has taken plenty of heat over the years for his transfer portal philosophy, with the narrative being that the longtime head coach refused to use the portal. But Swinney dipped into the portal this offseason to help bolster his roster, bringing in a trio of transfers in former Purdue defensive end Will Heldt, former Alabama edge rusher Jeremiah Alexander and former Southeast Missouri State receiver Tristan Smith.

“I love that Dabo, he didn’t change philosophy – he altered it a little bit by adding a couple of portal guys,” Barrie said. “I find his story absolutely brilliant because in a day and age where college football peer pressure is a thing, he was like, this is who I am and it will work. He weathered the storm, and look, it’s working.”

Barrie added that he’ll “give Dabo Swinney more credit than anyone in the country.”

“Why? Because he stuck to his philosophy – I am not gonna go build through free agency. What I’m gonna do is I’m gonna find guys that fit my culture, I’m going to develop them and I’m gonna use the money I do have at Clemson to keep them around and reward the guys that have worked their butts off to be a Clemson football player,” Barrie said.

“And everyone rips him, they’re like, ‘Good luck with that.’ OK, well, he just won an ACC Championship a year ago and played in the College Football Playoff by doing it his way. He did it his way. So, what’s wrong with that? And so now what people are saying… He’s got everybody returning, he’s got a veteran quarterback, and he’s added some talent via the portal. Maybe Dabo had it right all along – that finding guys that fit the Clemson way are better than finding guys that are just highly ranked to be on a roster.”

Swinney’s Tigers open the 2025 season against the Bayou Bengals of LSU on Saturday, Aug. 30 at Clemson’s Memorial Stadium.