CLEMSON — Dabo Swinney said they have been preparing for their trip to California since last year.
The Tigers arrived in California Wednesday evening, making the nearly seven-hour flight to Berkeley as they get set to play an ACC game on the West Coast for the first time in history. Clemson is set to play the Bears at 10:30 p.m., ET on ESPN.
“It is a long trip for a game,” Swinney said. “But we are excited about it. I have never been to Cal, so I am looking forward to a new experience.”
Obviously, it is not the first time Clemson has played a football game in California. The Tigers played Alabama in the 2019 College Football Playoff National Championship Game just 49 miles up the road in Santa Clara.
They, of course, won the game 44-16 to bring home the school’s third national championship in football.
The last time Clemson played a regular season game in California, was in 1966 when Frank Howard’s Tigers were defeated by No. 5 Southern Cal in the Los Angeles Coliseum.
Howard also led a 16th-ranked Clemson team to California to play the University of Pacific in Stockton in 1951. Pacific, who ended its football program at the end of the 1995 season, were ranked No. 20 and beat the Tigers 21-7 that afternoon.
“This is the farthest I have traveled (to play football), so it is going to be a little different,” Clemson defensive London Merritt said. “We are going out there early to get acclimated because of the time difference.”
Of course, the time difference is three hours, meaning the kickoff time in California will be 7:30 p.m., ET. Luckily for Clemson, it has played a couple of late games already due to lightning delays at LSU and in its home opener against Georgia Southern.
The LSU game did not start until 9:41 p.m., ET, while the Georgia Southern game started at 9:31 p.m., ET.
“After this year, you are pretty used to anything in any condition,” tight end Christian Bentancur said.
To have his team ready to play on West Coast time, Swinney said the Tigers will practice on Wednesday and Thursday at about 10:30 p.m., ET. Clemson will practice at Diablo Valley Community College, which is about 15 minutes from the team hotel.
“They got the next day and the next day (after that) to rest and sleep. We do not have to travel (on Thursday), we are already there,” Swinney said. “Kind of get them in a rhythm. Go to bed California time and all of that stuff.”
Swinney said the team’s itinerary was not modeled after anyone else who has already made the trip to play Cal or Stanford. However, they did speak with different people to see what they should do.
“We have been working on it for a year. The (operations) team went out there a year ago,” Swinney said. “We talked to people and different things, as far as what’s the best thing we should do, and again, we felt like this (was best), as opposed to getting out there on a normal day.
“Instead of having Thursday morning practice here and then flying out, let’s go and get them there and get the travel (out the way) and then reset them.”