Written by Erik Slaby
Charlotte, NC – With it raining on and off throughout the entire game, the 2nd ranked Clemson Tigers weathered an early storm by the Pittsburgh Panthers to defeat them by a final score of 42-10. This was Clemson’s fourth consecutive Atlantic Coast Conference Championship. With this win, Clemson will maintain their spot in the College Football Playoff rankings come Sunday. Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney spoke about how special this win was after the game.
“Just really, really amazing season,” said Swinney. “Proud of our team. 13-0. It’s just been a special year. It’s been a historic year. I mean, these guys, we always have our team goals. We sat down and we talked about some kind of goals within the goals. These guys have done an amazing job of working toward those things. Just unbelievable. I’ve never really been a part of a team like this. The consistent leadership and the focused leadership that we’ve had has been really special. For the seniors, their accomplishments, 53 wins now, obviously to win four in a row, it’s special.”
Early on in the first quarter, it seemed like it would be another dominant victory for the Tigers. Clemson was able to jump out a quick 14-0 lead, headlined by two one-play drives. The first “drive” was on the opening play of the game when Clemson running back Travis Etienne burst down the field for 75-yard touchdown run. That touchdown run was the earliest score in ACC Championship Game history as it was only 13 seconds into the game after the score.
The second “drive” occurred after Pittsburgh quarterback Kenny Pickett fumbled the football deep in their own territory and Clemson defensive tackle Christian Wilkins recovered the ball and returned it 18-yards to the Pittsburgh 3-yard line. On the first offensive play, Etienne powered in for a 3-yard touchdown. With 9:29 left in the first quarter, Clemson led 14-0.
Midway through the second quarter though, it seemed like Clemson could have their hands full with the Panthers. Following a 33-yard punt from Clemson punter Will Spiers, Pittsburgh began their drive on their 39-yard line. Pittsburgh proceeded to go on a six-play, 39-yard drive that ended with a one-yard touchdown run from Pittsburgh running back Qadree Ollison. On this drive, five of the plays were runs while only one was a pass. This touchdown brought the score to 14-10 and one could feel the Clemson fans in the stadium starting to get a bit nervous.
Clemson quickly responded to the Pittsburgh scoring drive with a seven play, 75-yard scoring drive of their own for the go-ahead score. Etienne got the drive started off swimmingly with a 45-yard run that gave Clemson the ball on the Pittsburgh 30-yard line. Six plays later, Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence completed a beautiful five-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Tee Higgins. The score became 21-10 and from that point on, Clemson never looked back.
Offensively, Clemson was led by Etienne who finished with 12 carries for 156 yards and two touchdowns. As a team, Clemson rushed for over 300 yards on the ground. Lawrence led the team in passing, completing 12 of 24 passes for 118 yards and two touchdowns. Swinney spoke after the game about the teams’ offensive production.
“For us to be able to run the ball 300 yards, a lot of credit to this guy next to me (Etienne),” said Swinney. “What a year he’s had. Special to watch Travis blossom into the player he is. But he took it over for us, that offensive line. We had no turnovers, rushed for 300 yards. We made just enough plays in the passing game.”
Conversely, Pittsburgh struggled offensively in the game, specifically in the passing game in which they were downright pitiful. Pickett finished the game having completed 4 of 16 passes for eight yards and one interception. Several times he appeared to have miscommunication issues with his receivers or threw inaccurate passes. Clemson’s defensive line was able to generate pressure throughout the night which hindered Pittsburgh’s passing offense. Pittsburgh head coach Pat Narduzzi spoke about the offense’s performance after the game.
“We got to make some plays,” said Narduzzi. “Comes down to the people out there on both sides of the football. We have people open at times, got to find them. It’s one guy or two guys a play, whether it’s a protection or the depth of a route or the read of a route. Sometimes we were throwing fades and the corner, quarterback aren’t on the same page whether we’re going to hit the comeback or the fade. Two of those. It’s a combination of things.”
Narduzzi also passionately defended Pickett and his position as Pittsburgh’s starting quarterback going forward.
“Kenny Pickett is one of the best competitors we have on this football team. There’s nobody, other than Kenny Pickett, I would want to lead our offense.” Narduzzi also added, “He’s played unbelievable this year. He made some great checks in our run game. We obviously didn’t throw it as well as we wanted to. You can mark that down to whatever it is. It ain’t all on the quarterback’s shoulders, period.”
Narduzzi closed by stating, “Kenny Pickett is our starting quarterback. You can’t criticize him. You can criticize the football team, criticize me. It starts with me, trickles all the way down to the last player that traveled with us in the 85. But it certainly is not on Kenny Pickett’s shoulders, period. He’s a competitor. I love that kid. He’s our starting quarterback. You guys can write what you want to write. He brought this team to the ACC championship game, period.”
With this victory, Clemson will have to wait until Sunday to figure out which semifinal game they will be competing in. As they are ranked 2nd in the country, they will either play in the Cotton Bowl at AT&T Stadium in Dallas, or in the Orange Bowl at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami. No matter what though, they will get a chance to compete for a spot in the 2019 CFP National Championship Game.
Regarding the playoff, Swinney stated with a grin on his face, “Aw shoot man, just tell us where we’re going, we’ll be ready to go. We’re excited about it. We’re excited to represent the ACC and see I we can get it done.”
