During Tuesday’s episode of ESPN’s College Football Live, analysts Tom Luginbill and Sam Acho chimed in on what host Zubin Mehenti called Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney’s “tamper tantrum” – Swinney’s allegations that Ole Miss was tampering with linebacker Luke Ferrelli.

During his press conference on Jan. 23, Swinney criticized Ole Miss head coach Pete Golding for allegedly luring Ferrelli into the transfer portal.

Swinney claims that Golding texted Ferrelli directly while he was sitting in class after having already enrolled at Clemson. Ferrelli had already signed his financial aid agreement and was taking part in football activities before ultimately re-entering the portal and committing to the Rebels on Jan. 22.

Clemson submitted a complaint to the NCAA alleging “blatant” tampering. The NCAA responded very quickly to Clemson’s allegations, with NCAA Vice President of enforcement Jon Duncan saying in a statement that the NCAA “will investigate any credible allegations of tampering and expect full cooperation from all involved as is required by NCAA rules.”

“There’s tampering, and then there’s blatant tampering,” Swinney said during his press conference. “Tampering 101 is when you’re talking to kids who aren’t in the portal. Tampering 201 is when you’ve already negotiated the deal when the kid’s not in the portal. Tampering 301 is when you’ve got a kid who’s gone in the portal, signed somewhere, moved there, gone to classes, and you’re texting them while they’re in class. That’s like a whole other level of tampering.”

“I’m not out to get anybody fired,” Swinney added. “That’s not my objective in this. I’m not out to get anybody fired. But there has to be accountability and consequences for this type of behavior and total disregard for the rules. If this happened in the NFL, which is an actual league with rules, they would be fined, they would take draft picks, they hit the cap, whatever. Again, I’m not trying to get anybody fired. I just want accountability, and there should be consequences for a total disregard for the rules. And this is such a terrible example. It’s a terrible example for young coaches in this profession. … To me, this situation is like having an affair on your honeymoon.”

Swinney also had a message to all the head coaches across the country, challenging fellow coaches to turn in tamperers and calling for his coaching colleagues to “be an example to young coaches in this profession and be people of integrity, or just shut your mouth and don’t complain again.”

“I have had a lot of people reach out with their stories,” Swinney said. “I want to challenge all of those coaches that have reached out to me. I want to challenge all of them. You need to step up and call it out. Otherwise, don’t complain.

“You either step up and you be an example to young coaches in this profession and be people of integrity, or just shut your mouth and don’t complain again.”

Luginbill was asked what he makes of Swinney being so forthright with his Ole Miss tampering comments.

“First off, I love it,” Luginbill said. “Second of all, you’ve got to make sure, if you’re Dabo and his staff, that your own house is clean, right. You don’t want to be throwing stones and then come to find out that somebody’s got receipts on one of your staff members doing the exact same thing. I think that’s really important. But what Dabo’s doing right here is something, as he referenced, probably most coaches don’t have the guts to do. But there has to come a moment in all of this where there is accountability and consequences. And he referenced the NFL, and he’s not wrong. If we’re gonna have rules and we’re gonna have guidelines and structure and we’re gonna have governance and policing and then hopefully enforcing, then you’re gonna have to come up with a way of putting the feet to the fire of the NCAA – which, right now, has zero teeth in all of this.

“Because if you really want to put an end to this, catch somebody red-handed and say alright, you’re missing the postseason next year. Or we’re docking you 10 scholarships. Or we’re removing some of your revenue share. Something that would be so severe as a deterrent that you wouldn’t even think to cross that line. Right now, we have none of that. All we have right now is a very dark gray area, which coaches live in anyway. I’m fine with that. I get that. But the reality of the situation is, something has to put a stop to this. Because this is the problem. It’s not name, image and likeness. It’s not the transfer portal. It’s tampering.”

Acho was asked – knowing how rampant of an issue tampering is in today’s age of college football — if he thinks there’s any chance that more coaches will call out other coaches for tampering, like Swinney did.

“I think it’s a very slight chance that more coaches calling out coaches happens,” Acho said. “Because notice, Dabo was calling out Pete Golding, but also he continued to say, ‘I’m not trying to get anybody fired.’ Coaching is somewhat of a fraternity, and Dabo went on in a later interview to outline some ideas that he had to be able to solve the issue. He said, ‘Hey, how about this, how about a player could transfer once, and then if your coach leaves, you could transfer again. But after that, if you decide to transfer, then all of a sudden, you have to miss a year.’ Well, that penalizes the player. I didn’t hear anything in that interview – maybe there was, and I missed – about penalizing the coach. Dabo did reference, in the NFL, how teams get docked draft picks, or coaches get fined, or teams miss playoff opportunities. Maybe that’s one of the solutions that can be presented that could actually help solve some of the issues.

“Remember, Dabo did call out Pete Golding for being the one texting Luke during meetings. And there were some agents saying, ‘Hey, we told Pete Golding to stop, and Pete Golding’s going to do what Pete Golding does.’ But my point is that the penalty should not be levied on the player. The penalty for some of the tampering should be levied on the coaches who are the ones who are texting and calling the players.”

Luginbill agreed, saying, “let’s not blame the player here.”

“We’ve created an environment where we’ve allowed this, right,” Luginbill said. “So, the player has an opportunity, if more money comes his way – it doesn’t matter if he signed a letter of intent, it doesn’t matter if he enrolled in school – none of it matters. So what the coaches are asking for, Dabo Swinney in particular here, is for that to matter, and there to be accountability if there are rules in place against this, to be levied against the coach, the assistant coach, the university, and for there to be distinct penalties – and penalties so severe… that you wouldn’t think to step over it.”