The Clemson Tigers are struggling to make sense of their historically sluggish start — and their quarterback has seemingly resorted to pointing fingers.
Clemson Cade Klubnik addressed the media following the team’s 34-21 home loss to Syracuse on Saturday, a frustrating defeat that knocked the Tigers to 1-3 on the season and 0-2 in ACC play.
The senior field general — who completed 61.7 percent of his passes for 363 yards, three touchdowns, and one interception — believed his Tigers were holding their own against the Orange when pushing the pace, but added that their momentum was consistently undone by Syracuse players getting injured or calling a timeout.
To Klubnik, the timing of the injuries and timeouts was awfully convenient, and the quarterback seemingly insinuated that Syracuse was faking injuries after Clemson would make a big play.
“We were doing it really all throughout the game. We were playing with tempo. Props to them, they stopped us on some third downs at certain times,” Klubnik told reporters. “Then they’d have an injury or something like that when we really got going. That’s up to them if they wanna be honest about that, but that was definitely tough for us to really get in a rhythm. We’re playing fast then unfortunately they’d have a guy get hurt or a timeout or something like that. I feel like we came out really healthy and hopefully they did too.”
Clemson struggled to find their footing while Syracuse scored in each of their first four drives of the game and amassed a 24-7 lead early in the second quarter. The Orange stretched their lead to as much as 20 in the third, putting the game on ice.
It’s been a crushing start to the year for Clemson, which is 1-3 for the first time since 2004 — their worst record to kick off a season under head coach Dabo Swinney.
Swinney, who led the Tigers to a pair of national championships in 2016 and 2018, characterized Saturday’s loss as a “pain that’s hard to describe.”
Following a timely bye week, Clemson will try to rebound on the road against North Carolina on Oct. 4. To Swinney, there’s no point in dwelling on missed opportunities — and it’s up to them to get the job done.
“It’s basically an eight-game season for us at this point. We’ve just got to fight our tails off to find a way to win a game, create some momentum.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
