The Clemson Insider went back and ranked Clemson’s 25 best teams of all-time.
What classifies a certain team as one of the best? Of course winning a championship—national or conference—will be the first qualification. The next qualifications are overall record, national ranking and where they fell in the conference standings.
We continue our rankings with the No. 24 team on our list:
The 1930 Tigers (8-2)
Clemson opened the year with six straight wins, including shutout victories over Wofford, NC State and Newberry. The Tigers had four shutout victories in 1930 as they outscored their opponents 239-82
Maxcey Welch set a Clemson record with five rushing touchdowns in Clemson’s 75-0 victory over Newberry on October 17, 1930.
The next week against rival South Carolina, Clemson earned one of its best wins of the season in Columbia, South Carolina. Welch was again at it, this time he was throwing it. He connected with Bob Jones for a 34-yard touchdown pass that tied the game at 7-7 in the second quarter on a post route, and before halftime he found Lionel Harvin down the middle of the field for another 34-yard gain to the Gamecocks’ three-yard line. Harvin scored on the next play to give the Tigers a 14-7 halftime lead.
In the third quarter, Welch used his legs to get Clemson in the end zone as he exploded around end for 38 yards to move the ball the South Carolina 19. After a five-yard gain moved the ball to the 14, Welch finished off the drive with a 14-yard run up the middle for a 20-7 lead.
The Gamecocks, who finished the season 6-4, had two opportunities to make things interesting in the fourth quarter, but Clemson’s defense came up with stops at its own 10 and 20-yard lines to stymie a South Carolina comeback.
After losing to Tennessee, beating VMI and then losing to Florida, the Tigers concluded the season with a hard-fought 12-7 victory over Furman, who was 6-3-1 that year. The win clinched Clemson’s third straight eight-win season – a first for the program.
The Tigers were 24-8 during that three-year stretch, the best three-year stretch in the program’s history at the time.
The Furman win turned out to be head coach Josh Cody’s last one as the Tigers’ head coach, despite the fact he signed a new contract to stay at Clemson through the 1932 season the previous March. Regardless, despite the student newspaper The Tiger publishing an extra edition urging Cody to stay, he formally made his resignation final on January 2, 1931.
In his four years as Clemson’s head coach, Cody produced all winning seasons and a 29-11-1 record overall, including a perfect 4-0 mark against South Carolina. He is still the only coach in Clemson history to have a perfect record against the Gamecocks.
—Photo courtesy Clemson Athletic Communications
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