Looking back on it, Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney says his 2016 national championship team “got all the rat poison” that year, to use the term coined by former Alabama coach Nick Saban to describe excessive media praise and hype surrounding a team.

The Tigers entered the 2016 season with high expectations after making a national championship game appearance in 2015.

As for this year’s Clemson team?

Swinney says his players have simply gotten the “you suck poison” after a shaky start to this season – a season that the Tigers came into with no shortage of hype and expectations, something Swinney doesn’t think this team has managed well.

“All the hype [in 2016], and it’s honestly similar to this team,” Swinney said during his weekly Tuesday press conference.

“That was the first time that they got all the rat poison, and that’s kind of this group. This group ain’t had the rat poison. They’ve just had the ‘you suck poison.’ And this is the first time this group has really had to manage that, and I don’t think some of them have managed it well, obviously. Just being real.”

Swinney compared Clemson’s start this season to 2016. Of course, the Tigers also struggled against Troy in Week 2 of that season.

The difference is that Clemson escaped a Week 1 road game at Auburn with a 19-13 win that year, while this year’s team lost the opener at home to LSU.

“I feel like I’m living 2016 all over again, honestly,” Swinney said. “In fact, I went back and looked at my notes from 2016 after the Troy game, just curious, and it was like I could’ve just walked into the team meeting with the same comments. Different reasons, but same comments. The only difference is we made one more play than Auburn in the opener. It came down to a Hail Mary. We played terrible. I think we dropped three touchdowns in that game.”

This year’s Clemson team was ranked No. 4 in the preseason AP Top 25 but has now slipped to No. 12 following the early season struggles. The Tigers (1-1) are set to play Georgia Tech (2-0) in the ACC opener for both teams on Saturday at the Yellow Jackets’ Bobby Dodd Stadium (12 p.m., ESPN).