CLEMSON — Dabo Swinney is extremely bullish on the class he just signed at Clemson.

So bullish in fact, that when the head coach took to the podium on Wednesday to go in-depth on his newest class of signees, he compared to one of the better ones he’s ever signed.

“What I will say about this group is they are unique,” Swinney said on signing day. “I believe they are similar to my (2011) class.”

“The reason I say that is, these guys stuck with us in the midst of the worst season we’ve had in 15 years around here. That says a lot about who they are. Because there is not one person in this signing class that somebody didn’t try to talk out of coming to Clemson. That somebody didn’t talk negative about Clemson. The noise — it is deafening. And their families stuck with Clemson.”

Swinney absolutely has a point there. With the Tigers getting off to a 1-3 start and then sitting at 3-5 heading into the final month of the regular season, it wouldn’t have been all that surprising to see the 2026 class fall apart. This was a team that was picked to win the ACC back in the preseason, with many predicting a national title run.

Things didn’t play out that way, and while the Tigers did suffer four decommitments, that number is much lower than the seven experienced during the previous recruiting cycle. Six of those came during the final few months of the cycle.

“I can’t say enough about what that says about who they are,” Swinney added. “In this day and age, when you get so much negative stuff, and this is a group of young people that stuck with us. And I say similar to my (2011) class because that is what happened with that group. After the 2010 season, when we were 6-7… I was a second-year head coach with about 15 total wins to my name. It wasn’t real sexy to come to Clemson.”

That 2011 class was a special one, for sure. It featured close to 30 signees, including three five-stars in WR Sammy Watkins and LBs Stephone Anthony and Tony Steward. It also included a handful of two-stars in Grady Jarrett, Kevin Dodd, Adam Humphries and Stanton Seckinger that would go on to become major contributors for the Tigers.

While this newest class is small in size (20 signees) and ranks about 10 spots lower in the national rankings, Swinney still sees a lot of similarities, and they go past this batch of recruits staying loyal through what ended up being a tumultuous season.

“I said back then that this (2011) group was going to come in and change Clemson,” said Swinney. “Sammy Watkins came to Clemson while we were 6-7. They chose to come to Clemson, and you know what they did? You can track what they did. We won the league the next year, won 10 games for the first time, and I say all of that to say, I feel the same way about this group.”

Photo by Bart Boatwright