Clemson football: Death Valley ranked No. 12 loudest stadium in the country

The Clemson football program has had the benefit of playing in one of the most home-friendly environments in the country.

Anyone who has stepped foot inside of Death Valley on a football Saturday knows just what we’re talking about.

The Clemson football faithful pile into Death Valley and 81,000 strong are able to make things extremely difficult on opponents week-in and week-out. When it comes time for the Tiger offense to take the field, you could hear a pen drop.

247 Sports recently published a list of the top-10 stadiums in the country and had Death Valley ranked No. 4.

"“Clemson is school that has some of the most iconic traditions in college football. For starters, when the Tigers take the field at home every week they run down a hill that is surrounded by thousands of fans cheering them on. But as the players run down the hill, they also touch “Howard’s Rock” that sits at the top of the hill. Of course, the rest of the gameday environment is loud and exciting enough as is, but those two traditions alone make it one of the best atmospheres in the sport,” 247 Sports’ Riley Gates wrote."

Still, a fan poll rankings doesn’t think so highly of Clemson football fans

Big Game Boomer recently published a list of the loudest College Football Stadiums in the country and the Tweet has received nearly 2,000 likes.

If you go through the list, though, you’d be surprised to find where Clemson falls.

The Tigers are ranked No. 12 in the nation behind the likes of South Carolina, Virginia Tech and Wisconsin, just to name a few.

Here’s a look at the top five, according to the account:

1. LSU
2. Penn State
3. Oregon
4. Florida
5. Texas A&M

I would like to know what criteria is used when making a ‘loudness’ rankings.

If you’re going based off of pure decibel records, Clemson would be second in the nation (132.8 decibels in 2007 against Boston College) only behind Washington (133.6 decibels in 1992 against Nebraska). It should be noted that despite Washington holding the decibel record, the Huskies were only ranked No. 17 on this list.

It’s not likely, in my opinion, that the creator of this list has ever been to Death Valley and it’s clear that if you’re ranking Williams-Brice Stadium- which typically is half empty following the second quarter- ahead of Clemson Memorial Stadium, you’ve likely got some biases.

When you’ve come to Death Valley and seen the difference that the crowd has on an opposing offense- delay of game penalties, timeouts taken, false starts- you would see that the loudness of the stadium and the atmosphere is as good as any in the country, without question.

It’s certainly better than No. 12 in the nation, which is just laughable.