Clemson is one step closer to being back to normal.
Dabo Swinney welcomed several hundred campers Wednesday to his first day-camp of the Dabo Swinney High School Football Camps for 2021. Swinney, who was unable to host his camps last year because of the pandemic, will hold five more one-day camps through this week and next week.
Swinney expressed to the campers what makes his football camps better than most others they might attend.
“This is a football camp. This is not a combine,” the Clemson head coach said. “Our goal in this camp is to help you get better and to give you some tools, so you have a better chance to be successful wherever you are on your journey. You might be a rising eighth grader. You might be a rising senior. But wherever you are on your journey, our goal is to help you and equip you.
“Maybe it is one thing. Maybe it is one drill. Maybe it is one different way of hearing something. Maybe it is one fundamental. Maybe it is just some encouragement. Maybe it is just confidence. Whatever it is, that is our goal today. To help you get better and to have some fun doing it. That is what this camp is going to be all about, so I challenge you to do just that, get better.”
Clemson, who hosted rising eighth-12th graders, had every position coach and staffer on the football team coaching and helping, as well as more than three-quarters of the football players. The campers practiced from 10 a.m.-12 p.m., and then from 2-4 p.m. There were five periods in each practice.
“The focus is on the position work. That is what the focus is on. It is on fundamentals. It is on technique,” Swinney said. “It is on the drills that are specific to your position, but also relevant to the game. But we are going to coach you and teach you exactly the way we coach our guys.”
Though they could not compete in Swinney’s famous “Swinney-Ball” this year, the Clemson coach said the campers still were able to compete in one-on-one drills, wide receiver-and-defensive back (Dallas) drills and OL-and-DL drills.
“(These are) to use those fundamentals and also to expose you where you are weak, so you can get better. Not to embarrass you, but to challenge you, so you can go and get better,” Swinney said.
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