Clemson is back in the College Football Playoff for the first time since the 2020 season, which capped a six-year stretch of consecutive playoff appearances for the Tigers.

And according to star defensive lineman Peter Woods, Clemson is determined to accomplish what the program has done twice in the CFP era, but not since 2018 – win the national championship.

“This is the first College Football Playoff in a while, but this is my first-ever College Football Playoff,” Woods said on Monday. “So, I think what I’ve been telling people is just we’re hungry. We’ve never done it before. It’s part of our lineage and part of our history, but nobody on this team has ever won a national championship. So, I think that’s something that a lot of people aren’t taking into account is how hungry we are to get this thing done.”

Clemson continues to embrace an “us against the world” mantra heading into this weekend’s College Football Playoff game at Texas.

Prior to the ACC Championship Game, Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney addressed his players in a team meeting and let them know that it was an “us against the world” situation.

As a three-loss team, many didn’t think the Tigers would beat the upstart Mustangs from SMU, which entered the ACC title game with only one loss overall this season and an undefeated record in conference play. But Swinney’s squad proved those people wrong with a 34-31 victory that clinched a spot for Clemson in the inaugural 12-team playoff.

Now, many analysts and fans are already counting Clemson (10-3) out again, as they get ready to take on Texas (11-2) in the CFP. The Tigers are the No. 12 seed and currently 12-point underdogs entering the first-round matchup against the fifth-seeded Longhorns at DKR-Texas Memorial Stadium on Saturday (4 p.m., TNT).

“It’s 110 percent the mentality of the team,” Woods said of the “us against the world” mentality. “Everybody knows, it’s really no secret that nobody wants us to be in the position that we are. But we take that as a complement and we kind of just wear it on our sleeve, and move accordingly. You don’t really let it affect your day-to-day preparation, but just keep that in the back of your head as like, we’re counted against, but we like it this way.”

Swinney believes the Tigers haven’t played their best game yet over the course of 13 games this season, but another chance to play a complete game awaits on Saturday, and Swinney feels his team will be dangerous if it’s able to do that against Texas.

Woods certainly agrees.

“That’s 100 percent true,” he said. “We just talked about it – a half here, a quarter there, a quarter there – and I think if you put together four quarters, that’s our best game. I think that’s the scary thing about us is we’ve yet to do that yet and we’ve been winning games.”