Head coach Dabo Swinney admits Clemson “could probably do a little better” when it comes to scheduling season openers.

Following Clemson’s 51-10 season-opening loss to LSU, Swinney addressed his scheduling philosophy on his radio show this week, saying that opening a season with major non-conference opponents makes less sense now in the expanded playoff era.

“That’s kind of been a philosophy for a long time,” Swinney said of opening with big non-conference games. “I mean, obviously we’ve had a bad stretch here. But in our history, we’ve been pretty good, but we’ve had a bad run. … So yeah, we could probably do a little better from a scheduling standpoint.”

While Clemson has historically scheduled tough openers, in part to build toughness and brand, Swinney noted that most big-time programs begin against opponents they are heavily favored to beat.

Swinney says Clemson doesn’t shy away from tough games, but because college football is “all about the playoff” now, high-profile Week 1 matchups against Power Four non-conference heavyweights carry unnecessary risk compared to early tune-up games — and thus a shift in scheduling strategy makes sense.

“I’d say it’s probably different now than when I first got the job,” Swinney said. “It was a big thing with me. I went to [former Clemson Athletic Director] Terry Don [Phillips] and I’m like, ‘Look, we need to play 10 all-in games every year. Let’s find us as big as we can get outside of the conference.’ Because I just felt like you need to expose yourself to that, so if you get to postseason, you’re prepared for those type of things. And to build our brand, that was a big part of it. We didn’t win them all, but we’ve won our share of them, and we’ve had some big ones. But building our brand and getting these matchups and TV and all that type of stuff.

“But now, honestly, you have so many new people every year and teams and things like that, I think every coach would probably prefer – like, most of these teams, they usually play somebody that they should beat. You can create good morale and get a chance to play a lot of people and all that type of stuff. And then maybe you play that type of game, Game 2 or something. … We don’t back away from that [tough openers]. I do think now that it’s really just all about the playoff – that’s all anybody cares about.”

Swinney’s comments followed a lopsided defeat against LSU that extended Clemson’s recent struggles in season openers.

The loss marked Clemson’s fourth consecutive loss in a season-opener and fifth in the past six seasons.

“At the end of the day, you play them as they come, and you’ve gotta find a way to win them,” Swinney said. “But it was awesome to be in that environment [at LSU]. Just disappointed we didn’t play better.”