Over the last seven years, Hugh Yaughn has seen some of the best athletes come through Dabo Swinney’s Football Camps. And that’s because he has the best advantage point to do it.
Yaughn stands in the tall tower that sits between the two outdoor practice fields behind Clemson’s Indoor Football Facility. He is the voice campers and coaches hear after every five-minute period comes to a close during the two practices each day.
“Period two,” he yells through the PA system.
Some of the great Clemson players Yaughn has seen come through Swinney’s camps, included DeAndre Hopkins, Sammy Watkins, Deshaun Watson, Mackensie Alexander, Shaq Lawson and Ben Boulware to name a few.
“There are so many, I can’t remember them all,” said Yaughn, who is 68 years old.
This year marks the 20th consecutive summer Yaughn has either coached or managed a Clemson football camp. Overall, he has helped with 22 football camps under Tommy West, Tommy Bowden and now Dabo Swinney. For 10 years, he was a manger for Cliff Ellis’ basketball camps when he was at Clemson.
“I love the people and I love the atmosphere,” said the former high school football coach of 40 years from Statesboro, Georgia. “I have worked with Coach West, Coach Bowden and Coach Swinney. All of them have been super and all of them are good people.”
Yaughn admits he has seen a bunch of stuff over the years, too much to recall. But, it’s all been good stuff – like one-handed catches and “stuff you might see on SportsCenter,” he said.
Yaughn first started working Clemson’s camps in 1983, when he came up with a former student of his named Alphonso Smith, who was his connection to Clemson. Smith eventually became the Tigers’ long-time equipment manager until he left for a new opportunity a few years back.
This year marks the 20th consecutive summer Hugh Yaughn has either coached or managed a Clemson football camp. Overall, he has helped with 22 football camps under Tommy West, Tommy Bowden and now Dabo Swinney. For 10 years, he was a manger for Cliff Ellis’ basketball camps when he was at Clemson. (photos courtesy Hugh Vaughn)
The first camp Yaughn worked was Ellis’ basketball camp. He said that’s when he fell in love with Clemson and, except for a couple of years when he was sick, he always comes back.
“My daughter, my grandson and granddaughters all wear Tiger stuff. My mailbox, my car, my truck, all of it has Clemson on it. The funny thing is we are right there in the middle of Georgia territory,” Yaughn said.
Yaughn says Georgia fans try to give him a hard time, but he just comes right back at them.
“They know not to mess with me about my Tigers,” he said.
As far as working the football camps, Yaughn says no one has done it better than Dabo Swinney.
“It’s day and night. It is run smoother,” he said. “Everything is on point and on time.”
Before Swinney took over as head coach in 2009, Yaughn worked as a manager, trainer and coach from time-to-time under West and Bowden. He and four other coaches were in charge of the second-seven graders in camp, which they would take over to the fields by Fike.
The first year he started with Clemson’s football camps, there were just 46 kids from the second grade through the third grade. This summer, Swinney hosted more than 2,000 second-seventh graders in his youth camp.
“Every afternoon I would go to the BI-LO and get popsicles so we would have popsicles for all the crew every afternoon,” Yaughn said. “It has come a long ways from 46 campers to over 1,000.”
When Swinney took over the camps in 2009, he moved Yaughn to the tower where he has watched it grow into one of the best football camps in the country. This year, Clemson had more than 4,000 players—second-12th grade—participate in camp, including 1,400 at Swinney’s High School Football Camp this week.
“When Coach Bowden was here, and I love him to death, but he would come and say ‘hey’ in the morning and then you would not see him again until that night,” Yaughn said. “Coach West was hands on with the line group a little bit, but Coach Bowden would see the parents when they checked in and then would come and see them again when they left.
“Dabo is out there working in the groups. He will jump in the defensive groups, he will jump in the offensive groups, and he will jump in the line groups. It does not matter. He will jump in there and coach the whole thing. He is here the whole time.”
The thing Yaughn likes the most about Swinney, “He treats the kid that maybe isn’t quite as good as the five-star kids just the same in camp. Everyone is treated the same,” he said.
Two ACC Championships, a national runner-up spot, two Orange Bowl titles, a berth in the College Football Playoff and 56 wins later Swinney has Clemson among the nation’s elite football programs. Yaughn, who is in charge of the heating and cooling equipment on Game Days, has witnessed it all in person; including a football camp that at one time was one of the smallest and has now turned into the largest.