Swinney on Uiagalelei's 'do or die' situation, Mason Trotter's career ends

On Miami DC and former Clemson DC Kevin Steele:

“He’s a great coach. He’s always been a great coach. Usually four down (lineman), man coverage, multiple with his coverages-- aggressive. I think he’s been able to adapt wherever he’s been.”

On Dan Radakovich taking the Miami job:

”Yeah, we talked about it. He actually came over to my house and let me know what was going on. We talked through it. We talked about the opportunity and why-- and all that. He went to grad school there. Kind of the next chapter for him. Something he wanted to go do.”

On first-year head coaches having success:

”A bunch of good players, that’s the first thing. I’ve never seen a good coach that didn’t have good players-- especially a quarterback-- and a great staff around them. At the end of the day, you’ve got to have good players that buy into what you are trying to do.”

On Trenton Simpson playing this week:

“Absolutely. He and Beaux (Collins) are kind of day-to-day. Working back into practice. They both have a chance to play. Walker Parks is back.”

On telling D.J. Uiagalelei things were ‘do or die’:

“I don’t know. We just had to deal with it. Bottom line is you’ve got to play better, or we’ve got to do something different. What does that look like? You might put somebody else in there, and they might not do well. He’s played well in eight games-- 8 of our 10 games, he’s played good. He’s had two where he didn’t play well-- they were in a row-- to have three bad ones in a row would have been something where you have to give someone else an opportunity. It’s on all of us to be at our best as well.”

On Mason Trotter’s situation: 

“We expected to get him back, but back in September, they had to do back surgery on him, and he’s done. They are not going to let him play anymore-- which is very disappointing because he’s a guy we anticipated getting back. Mason is going to stay. He’s rehabbing now. He’s going to transition and take the whistle from Hunter Rayburn. I hate he’s not going to be able to play, but he will be another ‘hand on deck’ next year. Those guys did a great job with (Will) Putnam.”

“It was crazy. He got out of bed and couldn’t walk. He’s never had a back problem. It’s the weirdest thing ever. He got up one morning and came in and had a back issue. So he ended up having to do surgery on him. He came to me a couple of weeks ago to let me know where it was medically, which was best for his future to not play. Kind of a freak thing. That’s all he told us. They had to go in and fix it. Pretty serious situation.”