Clemson concluded its spring practice season with the annual spring football game on Saturday, and the event drew a record crowd of approximately 50,500 people.
Here is what we heard following the Orange team’s 17-9 victory over the White team.
Head coach Dabo Swinney said he wanted 50,000 fans to show up to support his team, and Clemson fans answered. Although the upper deck was closed off, the lower deck was packed with fans of all ages.
“First of all, I just want to thank our crowd. It was awesome. It just gives us the opportunity to help develop our team. When you have 50,000 plus there, it creates a gameday environment and you cant simulate that at practice. To be able to have that added to the evaluation and to give a lot of young guys who really haven’t played yet, that feeling of having played in a game, that is priceless. It really is. This will be a lot of good tape that we can evaluate,” Swinney said. “Overall, solid spring. We are progressing.”
Swinney was pleased with what he saw on Saturday, and now the coaches will evaluate each player individually from the spring game film to truly determine how well they did. However, the best news was that no one got hurt.
“I thought it was competitive. There were really good plays on both sides. I thought we got out of it what we needed to, plus nobody got hurt, so that is always a positive because if you step in between the lines, it is physical,” Swinney said.
Co-offensive coordinator Tony Elliott agreed that he saw what he felt he needed to see from his players to conclude the spring season.
As for who has solidified the backup quarterback spot behind Deshaun Watson, Elliott said that it is not clear at the moment, but that they are hoping that they will know by September 5 after Kelly Bryant and Nick Schuessler complete their summer workouts and fall camp.
“I think we’ll have that, and that is what we are looking for. It was tough on Nick this spring with his class schedule. He missed a couple of practices, so he didn’t have as much of an opportunity to get evaluated like Kelly, but it was good for Kelly on the flip side because he got more reps,” Elliott said. “The summer is going to be big for those guys to be with Deshaun and work all summer, really pick his brain and build chemistry and timing with the receivers. Hopefully by the time September 5th comes, but as I said before, we have to bring Kelly along,” Elliott said.
On the defensive side of the ball, defensive coordinator Brent Venables wasn’t as pleased. He felt as though the performance was not an accurate portrayal of what the defense has been doing throughout the spring semester.
“We’ve had a better spring than what they did today,” When you put it together totality, we have guys that can do it so didn’t perform well today there in front of a good crowd. It’s going to be a pretty rowdy crowd here when we line up next.”
Photo Credit: Joshua S. Kelly-USA TODAY Sports
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