CLEMSON — Dabo Swinney was pretty straight forward on Tuesday when he was asked about Clemson’s offensive identity.
“Right now, it is not very good,” he said frankly.
He is not wrong.
That is the identity of Clemson’s offense, and it has everybody shaking their head as to why. With four starters back on the offensive line, a veteran quarterback and one of the best group of receivers in the country, the 12th-ranked Tigers were expected to be one of the top offenses in the country.
Through two games, that has not come to fruition.
Clemson (1-1) currently ranks near the bottom of the ACC in every major offensive statistical category. Granted, it is only two games, but this is not what its fans or the media expected from such a veteran group that was a top 10 offense in 2024.
“It’s early though. We will see. We have a long way to go,” Swinney said.
The Tigers, who open their ACC season on Saturday at Georgia Tech, are averaging 18.5 points and 288.5 yards per game thus far. They are averaging 75.5 yards per game on the ground and just 213 through the air.
In other words, the offense is not very good right now.
“It is routine stuff. We have done a poor job with routine stuff,” Swinney said.
The routine stuff consists of quarterback Cade Klubnik not being decisive and throwing the football on time. It consists of the offensive line missing blocks and not doing what they are supposed to do. It consists of wide receivers dropping passes.
“The frustrating part is that it has not shown up in practice,” Swinney said. “Then you get into that first game, and again, there was a lot there in that first game. In a game like that, you are going to get four or five plays, and we did not take advantage of those opportunities.”
Missing those opportunities cost Clemson against LSU and they nearly cost the Tigers against Troy. Klubnik missed several wide open reads that could have gone for big gains or even touchdowns. Left guard Collin Sadler failed to help out on a sack coming off the left side. Adam Randall was impatient on a run that could have gone a long way, and T.J. Moore dropped another long pass that could have set up a score.
The good news is the Tigers found their way by the end of the second quarter and scored 27 unanswered points from that point on. However, for them to go into Atlanta and beat a confident Georgia Tech team, the offense can’t afford to wait until late in the second quarter.
“We have to clean up the execution part from an offensive standpoint,” Swinney said. “We have not played with great rhythm and guys have to make the plays that are there. That is where it starts.
“Whether it is the quarterback or catching the ball, we got too many nine out of eleven guys doing their job. You are not going to be a great offense when that is the case.”