Dabo Swinney and Clemson had one more moment with their 2018 seniors on Saturday.

At halftime of Saturday’s Orange & White Spring Game, Clemson honored college football’s greatest senior class one more time by presenting them with their national championship rings in front of 60,000 people at Death Valley.

Those seniors went 55-4 in their four years at Clemson, tying Alabama’s 2018 senior class in victories. They also won four consecutive ACC Championships, just the second school in FBS history to do so in the conference championship game era. They played in three College Football Playoff National Championship Games and won two of them, including this past year’s 44-16 victory over Alabama in Santa Clara, Calif.

They also advanced to the CFP all four years at Clemson.

“To have that moment with our seniors, to get them in front of the crowd and get the team up there and for the team to be able to look them in the eye one more time, I think it was a special moment,” Swinney said.

But Saturday was also about moving on as fans got an opportunity for the first time in 2019 to see what their new Clemson team is going to look like. What they saw were plenty of new stars to go along with some of the old ones.

Everyone knew what to expect from quarterback Trevor Lawrence, running back Travis Etienne and wide receivers Justyn Ross and Tee Higgins. However, what they learned is how good freshmen receivers Frank Ladson and Joseph Ngata can be. They learned that Chase Brice might be as good as any other quarterback in the ACC not named Trevor Lawrence and that freshman corner Sheridan Jones is pretty special, too.

“The usual suspects that y’all expect to be good players, they were. But you got a chance to kind of catch a glimpse of some of the young talent and some of the new guys, whether it be the D-Line or some of the receivers or in the secondary or whatever,” Swinney said. “You saw plays from all of those guys. So, it was a lot of fun.”

But the spring game also showed this is a different team and nothing is going to be given to the Tigers this year, despite the lofty expectations everyone has for the defending national champions heading into 2019.

“We have a lot to do over these next four and a half months, and a lot of it is going to have to be player driven,” Swinney said. “We are going to give them the information and some of them have to take ownership of what they have to do.

“That is our job. We have to be very truthful and honest on where these guys are. Give them the information and the plan to go execute and to transform, as we say, and come back a better version of themselves in August. We have a lot to do. We are a long way away from being a game-ready team.”

Seeing the 2018 seniors one more time, brought back the realization to players like Lawrence that if the Tigers want to win another national championship this coming season, they have to want it and do whatever it takes to earn it again. No one is just going to give it to them.

“We lost a lot of those guys. It’s not to say we are not going to have great guys that step up, but it is not the same team,” he said. “That is one way you stay hungry. This is not the same team as last year. It is a lot different, so that is the motivation to work.”