CLEMSON — It’s official, the Clemson hype train has been derailed.

Coming into the season opener, the Tigers were ranked fourth in the AP Poll and one of the media darlings of the offseason. Multiple national analysts even picked this team to win the national title. On Saturday night, it appears that preseason praise was premature.

Ninth-ranked LSU came into Death Valley and handed Dabo Swinney’s team its third straight season-opening loss, and that vaunted offense that returned so much production, including a senior quarterback, managed just one touchdown and no points in the second half in a 17-10 loss.

Where’s the Beef?

LSU defensive coordinator Blake Baker absolutely out-coached Garrett Riley. That Clemson offensive line, which returned so much experience, was flat-out whipped all night long. The Bayou Bengals routinely played with six or seven men in the box, bringing pressure from all directions. What resulted was the Clemson running backs having literally no room to run, and instead of adjusting, Riley totally abandoned the running game.

Clemson’s final 19 plays were all passing plays. Only four times did the Tigers run the ball in the entire second half. And in a one-score game no less. At a certain point in that second half, everyone in the stadium knew Cade Klubnik was going to be dropping back to attempt a pass on every play, including the LSU coaching staff.

Far more often than not, Klubnik was having to abandon the pocket, and on the rare occasion the offensive line did hold up and create a clean pocket, the senior quarterback still wanted to scramble, almost like he was expecting immediate pressure every time he dropped back.

Adam Randall and the rest of those running backs are going to be on the receiving end of a lot of criticism after the team averaged just 1.6 yards per carry, but the running game was never given much of a chance at having any success. Just not the performance that was expected from the big boys up front.

Stagnant Offense

As noted already, Riley was outcoached. LSU used a lot of motion and misdirection in an effort to get some favorable matchups. It worked.

On the other side, Clemson just doesn’t seem to utilize a lot of that stuff. There just wasn’t much creativity on Saturday night. That’s for sure. Especially once the offense totally abandoned the run.

Great offensive coordinators have ways of scheming their best players open in the passing game, and the Tigers were not able to do that on Saturday.

What Waves of Terror?

Several times over the offseason, we heard Clemson’s wide receiver room and the depth they have there described as waves of terror. During the LSU loss, it wasn’t really seen.

Star wideouts Bryant Wesco and T.J. Moore both had key drops. No receiver had more than four catches and after all the praise during the offseason, transfer Tristan Smith was MIA.

Make no mistake, losing Antonio Williams on the second possession of the game was a big blow, but this team is supposed to have enough depth to overcome one injury.

Nice Debut for Tom Allen

Was it perfect? No. But if you hold this LSU team to just 17 points, that’s success. That’s a game you should win. Clemson even won the turnover battle 2-1.

There were still times when the defense was susceptible to the cutback runs, but those were mostly in the first half. Allen did a nice job adjusting, and over the final two quarters, LSU only totaled 43 yards on the ground, averaging just 2.5 yards per carry. All that to say, the run defense was much-improved from where it was over the final few games last season.

Garrett Nussmeier is one of the best quarterbacks in the country, and that LSU wide receiver room is elite. No defense is shutting those guys down completely. That offense did a really good job at executing the quick passing game, but overall, the secondary held up ok. There were a couple of big pass interference calls, with one coming on what looked like an uncatchable ball.

While there were still a few too many missed tackles, it wasn’t nearly to the level seen last year. Not a bad debut against what should be one of the nation’s better offenses.

Vaunted Defensive Front Neutralized

With LSU having to replace four starters along the offensive line and Clemson returning so much production on the defensive front, this was a matchup most thought the Tigers would win. They did not.

Again, Nussmeier executed the quick passing game almost to perfection, which pretty much neutralizes the front four. However, when he did attempt to throw down the field, he had time. Clemson got to him just once all night and only hurried him twice.

Transfer Will Heldt, who registered the only sack for Clemson, was one of the bright spots. As was Jahiem Lawson coming off the bench.

Punting Was Serviceable

For all of the worries about the punting, Jack Smith was fairly serviceable in the loss. He only punted three times, with his longest going for 50 yards. He averaged 44 yards per punt.

Electric Atmosphere

It’s been quite some time since we’ve seen an environment like that. The Clemson faithful showed up and showed out. However, it could have been so much better had the offense been more competitive.

That crowd was just waiting on an opportunity in that second half, particularly when it was getting late in the fourth quarter, to explode. Instead, they watched on as the offense kept shooting itself in the foot.

Back to Square One

Make no mistake, this was a brutal loss. Knowing this offense had chance after chance to go up two scores and failed to deliver makes it sting a little more. However, it’s still one loss.

Outside of winning the opener, every goal is still on the table for this team. With Troy coming to town on Saturday, this is a good opportunity to try and get some of the things that plagued the offense cleaned up before what is now a massive road game at Georgia Tech in two weeks.

Now we really find out what this team is made of.

Photo by Bart Boatwright