By Will Vandervort.
Clemson fans can still see it like it was yesterday, Artavis Scott taking a tunnel screen from quarterback Cole Stoudt on the first offensive play of the Russell Athletic Bowl and turning it into a 65-yard touchdown in the Tigers’ 40-6 victory over Oklahoma.
If they forgot about that, and I doubt they did, then surely they remember the touchdown runs of 53 and 70 yards against rival South Carolina or the 68-yard touchdown that turned the game and saved the season at Wake Forest.
So when Clemson fans hear or read about Artavis Scott, these are the images that automatically flow into their minds. For Scott, they are reminders of how hard he has worked and the benefits of sacrificing his senior year of high school.
Like the 15 freshmen who enrolled at Clemson this past January so they could participate in spring drills, Scott did the same in 2014. Why? He understood that if he wanted to be the kind of player he knows he is; he knew he had to come in and start working for it.
“That’s always my mindset,” he said following Wednesday’s practice. “If you go in there saying I can’t do this, then you should not be playing. I know I can play football. This is about confidence. If you think you can’t do something, then you are not going to do it.”
Scott finished his freshman season with a team-high 76 receptions for 965 yards and a team-best eight touchdowns, numbers good enough to earn him second-team All-ACC honors as well as Freshman All-American accolades.
“I knew coming in here that I was going to have to pick up on some new things, and by coming in here early as a new player and going in there with Coach (Jeff) Scott, that helped me out,” Artavis Scott said. “My mindset is just different. I’m not ever going to come into something and feel like I can’t do it.
“My confidence is high. I just went out there and did what I had to do.”
Scott’s confidence is high this year, too. Though he knows he will be a target and defenses will try to change things up, he isn’t worried about that because he has changed up a few things of his own.
“I know it is going to change, but it isn’t going to be any different for me,” he said. “I’m going to go out there and prepare hard like I have always done. They are going to game plan for me just like I’m going to game plan for them.”
Scott’s goals for this summer, and the 2015 season?
“All I’m worried about is getting better than I was. If I go in there and think about yesterday and what I did, that’s not going to help me,” he said. “Last year’s stats are not going to win this year’s battles. I’m just going out there every day and thinking about what I have to do as a player.”