CHARLOTTE — Clemson safety Tanner Muse has a foe in his own family, sort of.

The Muse household is divided, and there is a little sibling rivalry, now that Muse’s younger brother Nick is transferring into the South Carolina football program from William & Mary.

Tanner admits he didn’t exactly want to see his brother, a tight end, end up a Gamecock. But at the same time, he is supportive of his sibling’s college decision.

“I was trying to get him to take as many visits as he could, just make sure he knew where he wanted to go,” Tanner said Wednesday at the ACC Football Kickoff at the Westin Charlotte. “He told me that, and I was like, ‘Well, not the place I would have sent you, but if you love it, then so be it, I’ll support you no matter what.’

“We always try to help critique each other’s game as much as we can when we get to see each other. So, he loves it there, and I’m going to support him and only him.”

Nick, a third-team All-CAA selection as a sophomore in 2018, was a sought-after commodity after deciding to transfer, according to Tanner.

Ultimately, Nick was comfortable with the coaching staff at South Carolina, specifically head coach Will Muschamp and tight ends coach Bobby Bentley, and felt he would have a great opportunity to play right away and play a lot for the Gamecocks.

“There’s a few other schools – there’s really a bunch of schools – he really blew up within that little two-week span,” Tanner said. “I was like, ‘You should really take a visit to here and here and here.’ And he’d be like, ‘Yeah, but I think I want to go to South Carolina.’ I was like ‘OK, well, whatever. I don’t really care. If you enjoy it, you go do what you want to do.’

“But I tried to get him to go up north, Deep South. But he was like, ‘I really love it here, the coaches are good.’ So I was like, ‘Whatever man, I love you either way.’”

A four-year letterwinner at South Point High School in Belmont, N.C., Nick in 2017 became just the third W&M tight end to play, and just the second to earn a start, as a true freshman dating to 1989.

In 2018 as a sophomore, the 6-foot-5, 235-pounder ranked second on the team in catches (30), receiving yards (453) and touchdown catches (1), and seventh in the CAA in receiving yards per game (64.7).

“He’s definitely more of a receiving-type of tight end,” Tanner said, describing his brother as a player. “He can get open. He’s got good moves. He definitely needs to work on his blocking and things like that. Because I told him, I said, ‘Now you’re coming up to this Power Five school, imagine going to block Cle (Clelin Ferrell), and then you tell me how it works out.’ … He’s bigger than me, but he’s definitely got that to work on. He’s definitely a receiving tight end.”

Nick hopes to gain eligibility to play at South Carolina in 2019. If he is unable to get a waiver from the NCAA to do so, he would redshirt the upcoming season and have two years of eligibility left after that.

If Nick is allowed to take the field this fall and eventually play against Clemson on Nov. 30 at Death Valley, it would be a dream come true for Tanner, a fifth-year senior who earned third-team All-ACC honors in 2018 after recording 76 tackles (2.5 for loss), five pass breakups, 2.0 sacks and two interceptions across 15 games (all starts).

“That’s every brother’s dream, to be able to play each other on this level at this stage,” Tanner said. “You see a bunch of brothers through the NFL and things like that, and that’d be awesome. I mean, he’s a great player and I’d love to play against him. But I did tell him, I warned him — Dad’s on his side, mom’s on my side — so I told him and Dad, I said, ‘Look, if we get that opportunity, I’m going to give you all I got, so you better bring it because I’m going to bring it.’”