Back to the Bulletin Board: Clemson thinks continued dropping in the AP poll is 'cute'
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Clemson players and coaches found themselves joking around and laughing the entire plane ride home from their most recent road trip.
No, not because of anything that happened on the field during Clemson’s 45-10 victory over Louisville (4-3) on Saturday afternoon. But as the Tigers handled yet another opponent to win their 22nd consecutive game, they tried to get into the minds of the voters of the AP Poll and beat them to the punch of what most people inside Clemson’s program deem as a joke.
How far will we slide now?
If we keep winning at this rate, we’ll be out of the top 10 by December.
The team members were eluding to Clemson’s trend of dropping in the AP Poll in recent weeks. Clemson collected 55 of the 62 first-place votes in week five after a 4-0 start to the season and a win over Charlotte.
After a close 21-20 scare at North Carolina, the Tigers started to lose the benefit of the doubt and moved to No. 2 behind Alabama. There was no shake-up after both Alabama and Clemson had bye weeks, but when LSU beat a top-10 Florida team at home in week 7 while the orange-clad Tigers cruised to cover a 27-point spread against Florida State, LSU jumped Clemson to No. 2.
And by now you’ve seen the latest poll of Clemson dropping again to No. 4 after a 35-point win at Louisville. This time, national voters picked Ohio State to leapfrog over the defending national champions to No. 3 in the country.
It is uncommon to see a team that is unbeaten slip in the polls. And forgive this young writer if he’s forgetting a time where an undefeated, defending national champion dropped in three of the latest four polls.
The continued trend has outraged the entirety of Clemson’s fan base, including defensive coordinator Brent Venables’ daughter, Laney, who Brent said Tuesday should be the poster child for fans fuming at the polls.
Clemson’s program as a whole has said time and time again that they don’t pay attention to it and that these polls do not matter. But these days, all they can do is laugh.
“We have fun with it. We were joking on the bus on the way back (from Louisville),” co-offensive coordinator Jeff Scott said Tuesday. “That is one reason we’ve had the consistency that we’ve had the last four years, other than maybe seeing it and laughing about it. Our guys stay locked in on doing our part. To everybody’s disappointment, we show up in December and we’re where we want to be. That’s just kind of what feels like what is going to happen this year if we can stay focused and take care of our business.”
Scott mentioned that he was told Clemson has won five of its seven games by at least 31 points. By comparison, Alabama has won three, two of them against Group of Five opponents.
“It’s not really the rhetoric that we are seeing out there,” Scott said. “I think it’s just natural when you’ve won as many games as we’ve won. I can remember, as a college football fan, that can get old at some point whenever somebody else is winning that much.”
Part of being a successful coach is finding different creative ways to put a chip on a team’s shoulders. When he was head coach at Blythewood High School, Scott would log on to Microsoft Word and create his own news clippings of someone talking poorly about his team, print them out, and post them on the bulletin board.
Now, with social media being so relevant in today’s society, Scott and head coach Dabo Swinney don’t have to look far for the latest motivational tools. It’s practically thrown right in their face.
“Coach Swinney can find a way when you’re the No. 1 team to have fun and keep that edge,” Scott added. “It’s important. When you’ve won as many games as we’ve won, you have to fight human nature, which is to relax and think it’s just gonna happen.
“I will say that one of coach Swinney’s strengths is week in and week out, he has our guys kind of play and have that edge. You don’t have the consistency that we've had the last four years if you don’t.”
Clemson has built much of its success in recent years by playing the underdog role, the “us against the world” mentality. Until it faces an opponent the nation deems as a worthy adversary (which most likely won’t come until December 28), you won’t find much praise nationally after a Clemson win.
The first College Football Playoff rankings come out on Tuesday, Nov. 5 and only then will we see where the Tigers really stand in the grand scheme of things. College football has a funny way of working itself out and there are so many defining games in this season left to be played.
These coaches and players know that Clemson is right where it wants to be. An added chip on the shoulder to create more edge doesn’t hurt one bit.
“It just feels like that’s kind of been our position. It’s worked well for us, so I think if the shoe fits, wear it,” Scott added. “We’re that horse that’s kind of waiting right back there and all of a sudden, when it really matters here, we get into that Championship Phase.”
No one understands that more than starting safety K’Von Wallace. The veteran could only give a slight grin when he was asked what his thoughts were about Clemson dropping in the latest AP poll.
“We think it’s cute,” Wallace said smiling. “We don’t worry about that. We think it’s cute. We think it’s funny. One thing they can’t do, we go undefeated, they can’t leave us out of the playoffs, I know that. Whether we win by one each every game I believe, they can’t keep us out.”
When a team drops in the polls, most likely due to a loss, that usually means that team’s coaching staff has to get back to the drawing board to correct what went wrong.
But as Clemson keeps racking up wins, it continues to be given new reasons to get back to the bulletin board.