Alright, before I get to my main point on the football schedule, let’s rant about the parts that stink.
First, Clemson has only five days to get ready for a road game with Georgia Tech. In September. On a Thursday night. Kicking off ACC play. That’s enough to keep every single involved party—coaches, players, fans, employees, bandwagoners—awake for like a hundred straight hours.
The short week is mostly just a façade, though. Clemson has Troy and South Carolina State in the two prior weeks, so there will be plenty of time to cut block and defend the dive. Georgia Tech also has a short week to prepare for what might be the best offense in the nation, so there’s that.
The thing that really grinds my gears is the Friday trip to Boston. Yes, a Friday trip.
Now, if you’re thinking, “But Qualk, isn’t that when high school games are played?” you would be absolutely correct. Except for two or three matchups with downtrodden or easily forgotten programs, Friday is a sanctuary for high school football—especially in parts of the country where it is vitally important.
After I call a high school game, I generally catch a few minutes of college football before drifting off to sleep. It’s one of those things I could do without, but I watch because it’s on.
Now the Friday night plague has inched closer to the upstate of South Carolina. It’s not a home game, but if you rely on home ticket sales for Friday night high school games, it might as well be. Yes, some will choose to sit in the stands and listen to the Tigers on radio, and I applaud that choice. Others will watch at home and find a high school game on radio, which isn’t as good but is alright.
Ultimately, though, the ACC has forced people in a football-crazed state to choose between two entities that used to be mutually exclusive: local high school football or Clemson football. That might work well for little riff-raff schools like Wake Forest or Syracuse or Boston College, but Clemson is way above nonsense novelty scheduling.
There used to be an understood divide between Friday (prep), Saturday (college), and Sunday (NFL). I, for one, don’t appreciate the ACC allowing those lines to be blurred or crossed when my own community could be negatively impacted by that choice.
Exhale. Okay, I’m ready to move on now.
Outside of those concerns—one rant-worthy, one minor—this schedule is an absolute dream if you’re a fan of the Tigers. The bye week isn’t skewed one way or the other. There isn’t one single instance where Clemson will have to play consecutive road games. The toughest two-game stretch is the Georgia Tech-Louisville pairing, but besides that, Clemson doesn’t even play consecutive games against remotely good teams all season.
In short, Clemson might finish 10-2, but only if the plot from World War Z plays out in the area. Otherwise, finding even a second loss for the Tigers requires a serious suspension of disbelief.
But I know you, and I know you’re out there trying your best to find a way to give Clemson some tough games. Don’t lie. I’ve seen your tweets pretending Boston College or Pittsburgh can realistically hang with this bunch of Tigers.
Maybe it’s a survival instinct, since easy schedules are often laughed off by pundits. Maybe it’s a defense mechanism, because overconfidence is scary. Maybe you’re a historian and you like to pretend it’s 2005 every year. Maybe you just like to be a contrarian and go against the grain.
Whatever the reason, it’s unnecessary. Don’t be afraid to walk in victory. Clemson is way past the point of concerning itself with teams that barely win more than they lose. In many ways, this schedule release is a distraction from the only thing that matters (warning, Dabo cliché coming): It’s about Clemson.
There are too many problems in the world for us to spend time inventing new ones. The vast majority of these games represent absolutely no threat to Clemson making a repeat appearance in the College Football Playoff once again next season. There’s no need to create an alternate universe in which that’s true, especially if you’re a professing Clemson fan.
Enjoy this day, the day the path was revealed. And by all means, contact your commissioner to complain about Friday night football.
God Bless!
WQ