Dabo Swinney was skeptical when Brent Venables told him a four-star defensive tackle from Hawaii was interested in Clemson.

“I’m just like, ‘Do you just want a recruiting trip to Hawaii?’” Swinney recalls. “‘We’re not getting that kid from Hawaii.’”

Scott Pagano’s family wanted to relocate to the Southeast once he chose a college, so the summer before his senior year of high school they visited Clemson. Pagano, his mother and sister had already stopped at Alabama, Florida and LSU during a grueling eight-day tour.

“We just happened to be one of the schools that they wanted to check out,” Swinney said.

Clemson was the last stop, and within a matter of days, he accepted Swinney’s offer, expanding the program’s influence another several thousand miles west.

Swinney wants Clemson football to swim with the sharks in the deep end of the talent pool. In a state with a population of just under 5 million and a highly motivated program wading in the same water, Clemson needed to broaden and re-establish a recruiting base that had begun to erode on the fringes.

With bordering states of North Carolina and Georgia and athletically fertile Florida within an easy drive, Swinney and his staff pull the majority of their talent from an area that TCI has dubbed “The State of Clemson.”

“That’s where it starts for us. … We’ve really put a lot of manpower, a lot of legs on the ground there in recruiting,” Swinney said. “That’s the heart of our program. Always will be.”

But as the brand has grown in Swinney’s eight seasons as head coach, Clemson has extended its reach, pulling talent from New England to Hawaii. And though the base of recruiting remains in the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida, the program has attracted a geographically eclectic mix of players.

Of the 175 signed by Clemson since Swinney’s first recruiting class in 2009, 145 were from The State of Clemson. The other 30 were from 13 states, coast to coast and beyond.

“We’re always going to win from the inside-out, always. I mean, we’re always going to win right here — if we’re going to have a great program, we’re going to have to be great here in South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia and Florida,” Swinney said.

That’s exactly what they’ve done since he took over the full-time head coaching job in December of 2008. From DeAndre Hopkins (Central) to Stephone Anthony (Polkton, N.C.), Vic Beasley (Adairsville, Ga.) and Sammy Watkins (Fort Myers, Fla.), the four states have provided Clemson with the means to reassert itself on the national stage.

Where would Clemson have been during its run to the national championship game last season without Shaq Lawson (Central, S.C.), Deshaun Watson (Gainesville, Ga.) and Eric Mac Lain (Hope Mills, N.C.)?

Florida, the fourth-most-populated state in the country and one of the most fertile fishing beds in the college football universe, regularly produces top talent that attracts college scouts from all over the map. A survey last year by SB Nation reported that from 2011 through 2015 Florida produced 1,295 high-end prospects, second nationally to Texas which counted 1,337. California was a distant third.

Clemson regularly pulls some of the biggest and best from Florida. Last season alone, Clemson was beneficiary of Florida talents Mackensie Alexander (Immokalee), Jordan Leggett (Navarre) and Artavis Scott (Clearwater).

As crucial as the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida have been to Clemson’s success, other states have contributed plenty of difference-makers to the program. Swinney’s first class included quarterback Tajh Boyd from Virginia. Swinney credits Boyd for helping to lay the foundation for the Tigers’ current run of success.

Once Clemson restaked its positions in Georgia and North Carolina, Swinney continued to push the program’s visibility up the Atlantic coast. The current roster includes linebackers Dorian O’Daniel (Olney, Md.) and Chad Smith (Sterling, Va.), offensive lineman Justin Falcinelli (Middletown, Md.), defensive end Clelin Ferrell (Richmond, Va.), linebacker Shaq Smith (Baltimore) and defensive lineman Christian Wilkins (Springfield, Mass.).

Defensive back K’Von Wallace (Highland Springs, Va.) was added to the group when he signed in February. Along with Wallace’s home state of Virginia and Smith’s home state of Maryland, eight others were represented in Clemson’s 2016 signing class: South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Texas, Colorado, Kansas and Alabama, marking the first time since 1994 that Clemson’s inked players from that many states in a single class.

“That speaks to the strength of our brand and people want to come see Clemson,” Swinney said. “We’re not going to just load up and go to Kansas, but you’ve got somebody who’s expressing interest — they want to come see our campus. We all know if we just get them on this campus that we have a real shot.”

Similarly, the Clemson recruiting footprint first began to expand to uncommon areas during the final years of Danny Ford’s reign. The national TV exposure of bowl wins over Nebraska, Penn State, Oklahoma and Stanford helped spread the brand.

And while Ford was near legend for his weekly road trips to high schools in the Carolinas and Georgia, talent scout Clyde Wrenn was building an expansive database of prospects.

At one point Wrenn boasted of Clemson’s recruiting being “national” in scope as they began reaching players well up the Atlantic coast into New England and as far west as Texas.

The 2016 Clemson scholarship roster includes 58 players whose home falls within the borders of The State of Clemson. Most (27) are from South Carolina, followed by Georgia with 16, North Carolina 15 and Florida 11.

Other states represented on the Clemson roster are Hawaii, Tennessee, plus Texas, Colorado and Alabama, and there are the seven from the Mid-Atlantic/New England regions.

When days after the national championship game MacKensie Alexander, Jayron Kearse and T.J. Green all decided to enter the NFL Draft with a year of eligibility remaining, Swinney’s staff quickly mined a relatively new vein of talent, signing two top prospects from the state of Kansas.

Clemson’s continued success could open more doors beyond the borders of Carolinas, Georgia and Florida.

“It certainly has impacted the overall reach of our program,” Swinney said.

Wins on Saturdays don’t always seal the deal.

“At the end of the day we’ve got to get them on campus, so it’s allowed us to really recruit the best of the best,” Swinney said.

In this business, recruiting is the lifeblood.

“That’s the heart of our program, and always will be, but as we have built our program and had success and seen our brand grow nationally, we get people calling us,” Swinney said. “We’re not just going to go on wild-goose chases. There’s plenty of good players out there, but all of a sudden you have a kid like Christian Wilkins. … Once we get a guy on campus, we’ve got a shot.

“People are going to like Clemson, and so that’s really what it boils down to.”

That’s how the Tigers landed players like Pagano.

“Again, the reason for that is because our brand is growing and the success that we’ve had,” Swinney said. “It certainly has impacted the overall reach of our program.”

So whoever they are, wherever they’re from, Swinney wants to chase the best players in the country. As an example, some of the earliest commitments in the class of 2017 include players from Indiana, Ohio, New York and Tennessee.

However, there are no delusions of Manifest Destiny. Swinney knows the area needs to recruit the hardest, to make his money: The State of Clemson.

—This is an insert from TCI’s preseason magazine “Unfinished Business — An insider look at Clemson’s 2016 season.” If you did not get an issue of “Unfinished Business”  you  can order one here.

—Photo Credit: Robert Duyos-USA TODAY Sports