By Will Vandervort.

By Will Vandervort

WINSTON-SALEM. N.C. — Clemson people like to call Wake Forest’s BB&T Field at Grove Stadium a “House of Horrors” for their Tigers. But the only thing horrifying in Thursday night’s game against the Demon Deacons was the way the home team played.

Number thirteen Clemson scored on five straight possessions in the first half as it rolled to a 42-13 victory. It was the Tigers second win on an ESPN Thursday night game in 11 tries.

“Thursday is what we call a ‘Team Thursday’ and that was the epitome of what today was,” Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney said. “It was a great team win in all three phases. We did some good things.”

The Tigers (7-1, 4-1 ACC) did a lot of good things. They racked up 537 total yards of offense and got five touchdown passes from quarterback Tajh Boyd in winning their fourth straight game. Boyd finished the night with a school-record 428 yards on 27 of 38 passes, breaking Charlie Whitehurst’s record of 420 set in 2002 at Duke.

“It feels good to do that, but the more impressive thing was the way we came out and performed early on,” quarterback Tajh Boyd said. “I’m really proud about the energy and the level that these guys played to today.”

Boyd had to really proud of his defense. Like the offense, they also got into the act as it held the Demon Deacons to 290 yards, including just 51 yards rushing. It was the first time this year the defense held an opponent under 300 total yards and had five sacks, the most since the season-opener in 2010 against North Texas.

It did all of this despite the fact it was missing two starters in the secondary and a third corner. Garry Peters left the game in the third quarter.

“Defensively, five sacks is tremendous,” Swinney said. “That the most we have had since 2010 and think (Vic) Beasley had a couple of them. I’m really proud of how Cortez Davis played. Here is a guy that hasn’t had a lot of reps in practice… I thought he stepped up and did some good things and got a turnover for us.

“He did a lot of good things.”

The story of the game, however, was wide receiver Sammy Watkins.  After sitting out the first series of the game due to being late to a team meeting, Watkins hauled in a 57-yard pass down the far sideline, a 61-yard touchdown reception on the next series and then a 50-yard reception after that, which set up a DeAndre Hopkins touchdown.

The sophomore finished the game with 202 yards on eight catches, breaking DeAndre Hopkins school-record for receiving yards in a game, which he set on Sept. 29 at Boston College. Watkins had 177 receiving yards in the first half alone on five catches.

“Maybe everybody will quit asking me about Sammy Watkins now,” Swinney joked. “He has played four and half games now, and I think he set the school record for receiving yards tonight. He had a great game tonight and it was great to see him have some big plays.”

Behind Boyd, who threw touchdown passes of 9, 61, 12, 12 and 2 yards, the Tigers racked up 345 yards in route to a 35-7 lead at the half. The five touchdown passes in the first half set a Clemson record as well. After completing passes to only three receivers last week, Boyd threw five touchdown passes to five different receivers – Brandon Ford, Watkins, Sam Cooper, Hopkins and Charone Peak.

“I just played within the system and took what the defense gave me,” Boyd said. “It was a different type of defense that they ran. It was an odd defense and they dropped different players and things of that nature.

“I did not want to come out and start forcing things and taking things that were not there so guys got open and we made big plays and I was able to hit them.”

Wake Forest (4-4, 2-4) made things interesting for a while as quarterback Tanner Price hit Tommy Bohanon for an 8-yard scoring pass with 12 seconds left in the first half, and then found the fullback again from 18 yards out on the Deacons’ second possession of the third quarter.

Clemson put to bed any hopes of a Wake comeback to bed in the fourth quarter when running back D.J. Howard scored on a one-yard run to cap a 13-play, 86 yard drive with 8:44 to play.

“It was a great job by the team and our staff and it was good to get a win on a Thursday night,” Swinney said. “Everybody has been reminding me all week that Clemson is 1-9 on Thursday night games. So maybe we can start a new tradition.”