Thanks to Syracuse and its upset victory over Miami last Saturday, Clemson has the chance to play for the ACC Championship on Saturday against SMU.

Clemson’s College Football Playoff hopes are still alive as well courtesy of Syracuse, as if the Tigers win the ACC title, they will earn an automatic bid to the new 12-team playoff as one of the five highest-ranked conference champions.

Syracuse head coach Fran Brown certainly did Clemson a big favor by leading his team to the win over Miami and putting the Tigers in the conference title game – and Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney would evidently be happy to return the favor to Brown with an invite to a national championship parade.

During his weekly Tuesday press conference, Swinney said if the Tigers were to make the playoff and ultimately win the national championship, Brown will be with him for the celebration in the parade – riding in a convertible in downtown Clemson.

“If that happens – like let’s dream big, hey why not? – Fran Brown, he’s gonna be riding in the car with me, convertible, through downtown Clemson,” Swinney said with a big smile.

“If we win the national championship, he’s gonna be riding in the car with me through downtown Clemson. Just go ahead and print that right now, y’all right it down. And why not, like why not? It’s just football. We’ve got a bunch of good football players. All you’ve got to do is win the game you’re playing. Why not? Somebody’s gonna win it.”

Swinney mentioned that Clemson was “the first 15-0 national championship team” in 2018, so maybe the Tigers “can be the first three-loss (national championship) team.”

“So why not? It’s postseason. We ain’t gotta go play 12 games. We’ve just gotta win a few of ‘em. Let’s see what happens,” Swinney said.

“We’re gonna give it all we got, I promise you that. We’re gonna give it all we got, and then we’ll regroup and go from there.”