By Will Vandervort.
Clemson offensive coordinator Chad Morris says he plans to open up the offense a little more now that Deshaun Watson is back in the shotgun.
Head coach Dabo Swinney said on Sunday the true freshman will start Saturday’s game at No. 23 Georgia Tech.
The 17th-ranked Tigers have struggled at times on the offensive side of the ball since Watson got hurt in the Louisville game. Clemson averaged just 357.5 yards a game in the four weeks Watson was out of the lineup and 22.5 points.
In the three games before he broke his right index finger, the Tigers were averaging 476 yards and 36 points per game.
“I think what we have done is we have – not just because we lost Deshaun, but the circumstances we had, we really had to simplify a whole lot,” said Morris on Monday from the WestZone in Memorial Stadium.
Morris says the Tigers have been as simple on offense as they have ever been in the last three seasons.
But Watson gives Clemson different options than what backup quarterback Cole Stoudt can give. Even with the injuries and situations they have on the offensive line his ability to keep plays alive and his ability to run the football allows Morris to call the game more aggressively than he would with Stoudt or anyone else running the offense with those kinds of deficiency.
Watson also gives the Tigers (7-2, 6-1 ACC) more of threat running the ball in the zone-read game which can complement running back Wayne Gallman, who has produced back-to-back 100-yard games in wins over Syracuse and Wake Forest.
Gallman was named ACC Rookie of the Week for the second straight game after rushing for 109 yards, plus a 30-yard touchdown in the Tigers’ win at Wake Forest. He has caught four passes for 43 yards and scored on an 18-yard touchdown pass from Stoudt.
“We have tried to simplify a lot of things for different reasons and circumstances,” Morris said. “I did feel like early in the year – NC State, North Carolina – those weeks and even Louisville that we were really opening it up and we were really trying to grow it to where we wanted it to be.
“We were seeing a lot of (good) things. And then obviously losing Deshaun did not help matters so we did have to go back.”
In the two starts against North Carolina and NC State, Clemson tallied 50 and 41 points respectively with Watson at the helm. He threw for 455 yards and six scores against the Tar Heels and then had four total touchdowns against NC State.
Watson started the Louisville game too, but was injured near the end of the first quarter when his finger got stuck in the facemask of a Cardinals’ defender.
“We want to play fast and to play comfortable,” Morris said. “We will see. We will see how the game planning goes, but yeah, we will definitely open some other things back up for sure.”
There will be no holding Watson back, either. Morris says he has been cleared to play by the team’s doctors and can do anything in the offense that he did before the injury.
“He is ready to go and will be ready to go. We hope he will be able to pick up where he left off,” Morris said.
“That has been my question. Would he be limited in that area or this area,” the Clemson coach continued. “We have been well at five weeks, and he has been cleared to play. There is no holding back.”